Why T1 Revealed Their Most Desired Opponent at First Stand
In the current 2025 season, Riot Games has made notable changes to the annual League of Legends tournaments. Accordingly, they have created an additional tournament called 2025 First Stand with 5 teams winning the opening tournaments from various regions. The champion of the 2025 First Stand will provide their region with a direct invitation to the group stage of MSI 2025 without going through the Play-In stage. Although it is on a smaller scale compared to past international tournaments, the 2025 First Stand is still a highly valuable title that top teams in the LCK like T1, Gen.G, HLE… are aiming for.
Therefore, immediately after T1 defeated NS to qualify for the playoffs of the LCK Cup 2025, they received numerous questions regarding the First Stand tournament. In response to this issue, T1’s jungler star – Oner revealed that they really want to face IG in the first international tournament of 2025. The reason he gave is closely related to Rookie, and Oner also holds a high opinion of the mid-laner from IG.
“I think IG is an interesting opponent and I really want to face them. Players from IG like TheShy, Rookie, and even coach Daeny have a deep understanding of League of Legends. I’ve always wanted to face Rookie, someone I’ve encountered in the past, but never had the chance in an official match. Rookie has always been an extremely skilled player for me, but T1 rarely gets the opportunity to clash with him. I look forward to meeting Rookie and IG if we have a spot in the 2025 First Stand tournament” – Oner shared with the media after defeating NS.
LPL Fans Claim T1 Wants to ‘Farm Chickens’ by Choosing IG
Right after the aforementioned interview was published, it became the center of discussion among the LPL audience. Many even mocked that T1’s star chose IG in order to ‘farm chickens’ and destroy this team in the future. The reason stems from the fact that IG is currently not highly regarded in the LPL, possessing neither high performance nor quality gameplay.
It should be noted that even in IG’s recent victory against RNG, coach Daeny has frequently been seen ‘fainting’ when witnessing his players handle situations poorly. This indicates that IG currently has too many issues and is unlikely to be a contender for the LPL 2025 Split 1 championship, let alone securing a spot in the First Stand. It’s likely that Oner also realizes this and wants T1’s journey to the First Stand championship (if any) to be easier, which is why he chose IG.
Basically, IG in 2025 is a lineup filled with many star players and attracts a lot of attention from the audience. However, that prospect seems very difficult as the path for both IG and T1 to secure a spot in this tournament will be quite challenging in the near future. Hopefully, both IG and T1 will become stronger, achieving important victories in the future so that this ‘viewership magnet’ match has a chance to become a reality.