After the conclusion of the LPL Spring 2021 tournament, TheShy has returned to South Korea to spend time resting with his family. Here, he had an online chat with his hometown fans and revealed some interesting stories about his competitive career.
One of the most notable details was about TheShy’s champion pool. Along with the fluctuating performance of Invictus Gaming since 2020, TheShy’s playstyle has also been questioned as a reason for this decline.
In the 2020 season, TheShy frequently used marksman champions in the top lane, and the reality showed that while IG performed relatively well in the group stage, the results in the knockout stage were very poor. The LPL Spring 2021 was even more disastrous, as this team struggled greatly throughout the group stage.
Many opinions suggest that this issue stems from “TheShy refusing to play tank champions.” However, in the talk show, TheShy completely denied this accusation:
“It’s not that I don’t want to play tank champions; I have suggested playing tank champions many times. But my teammates rejected this. They said the team needed a stable damage output, and that’s why I’m always asked to play top-lane carry.”
The reality is that since JackeyLove left, their bot lane has not been able to maintain the necessary reliability. Rookie cannot always carry the team, while the most skilled player remains TheShy. This might be the reason why the IG lineup unanimously agreed to have TheShy play carry, or rather, he was forced to do so to serve the team’s common goal.
TheShy was once rated as a “one-season player” since apart from winning the 2018 World Championship, he has never regained his destructive instinct. But fairly speaking, the responsibility for IG’s decline cannot be solely placed on TheShy. The fact is that after 2018, both Ning and Rookie have also stagnated in performance. After that, JackeyLove left, and IG continuously had personnel changes, leading to a loss of their inherent stability.
Meanwhile, despite a decline in skills, TheShy’s game mentality is still something IG can leverage and utilize. This might be the reason why this team continues to place their trust in their star player.