The Gap Between Major and Minor Regions Isn’t Closing
Before coming into this year’s MSI, a lot of lol betting experts were wondering if the gap was actually closing and if teams from the minor regions would actually have a chance against teams like T1, RNG, or at least EU and NA. But the answer seems to be a big no. T1 and RNG completely stomped every single team from the minor regions, not even the PCS and VCS representatives had the slimmest chance to take them down, which was surprising considering that in the past we’ve seen them upset teams from major regions.
Now, Saigon Buffalo and PSG Talon advanced to the rumble stage where they will have another chance at taking down the big teams. G2 Esports and Evil Geniuses are their main objectives as T1 and RNG already proved to the competition that they are nowhere close to dropping a game against them. If either of the VCS and PCS representatives manages to upset NA or EU then it’s going to be a huge victory in their books and fans can keep their hopes alive of seeing a minor region make it into the playoffs stage once again.
Once Again, EU Greater Than NA
After seeing Evil Geniuses take down 100 Thieves in such a dominating fashion and have the fastest LCS grand finals in history, a lot of us were expecting that NA would at least have a chance against EU in this year’s MSI. But all of us were wrong, and it actually looked even worse than before. Evil Geniuses simply was overpowered by G2 Esports, they were outclassed in every single position, and although G2, at some points, gave EG a lot of opportunities to take over a game, they were never able to do it.
One of the most disappointing things is that Jojopyun and Danny gave hope to a lot of North American fans as they are the up-and-coming rookies representing the region, but they were nowhere close to matching up against their opponents. Whether it’s just the way Evil Geniuses played or that North America is really behind compared to Europe when it comes to playstyles, it’s tough to see NA so hopeless against EU. The worst of all is that it looks like it’s going to take more than a couple of international appearances for NA to catch up to the rest of the major regions.
This is The 2nd Time a Team Goes Winless at an MSI
In 2015, we saw TCL’s Beşiktaş Esports become the first team to play 6 games without being able to win a single on the MSI stage. Now, LCO’s order joins the club after losing 8 games in a row. This must be really sad for all the LCO fans as we’ve seen the region struggle time and time again in the past, especially after Riot decided to drop off the OPL as an official league. ORDER came with high hopes into this year’s MSI as this was their first time representing their region on the international stage.
ORDER defied the lol odds when they took down Chiefs in the LCO 2022 Spring Split grand finals, but the competition in this year’s MSI hit them with a hard truth, Oceania is far behind the rest, and in fact, it looks like it’s getting worse and worse each year. Now the Oceanic teams will have to rethink their expectations going into the next international tournament when this year’s World Championship arrives. Maybe the play-ins will be a different story for the LCO representatives, but that’s something that we still have to see.
