After a very spicy winter split, especially in some of the regions, it’s time for the season’s first international League of Legends event, First Stand. Teams from every region gathered in Brazil to fight for the prize pool of $1,000,000.
Korean and Chinese teams are the clear favorites, pretty much as always, and the competition’s Day 1 started with the match between LPL’s first seed against LCK’s second. Bilibili Gaming were favored in this matchup, as they managed to assemble a superteam once again. For BNK FEARX, it was time to prove that the historic LCK Cup run wasn’t a fluke.
In game 1, BLG’s Bin demonstrated one more time just why Jax is his signature champion: 11/1/2 in a hard-carry performance. In game 2, BFX struck back on the back of Diable, who got a much-deserved pentakill on Jinx. Game 3 was a bit of a rollercoaster, with the gold lead changing sides numerous times, but the Korean team managed to clutch it out and move onto the match point.
BLG wouldn’t be BLG if they gave up this easily: 20:4 in game 4 to tie the series. Unfortunately, in the final game, Diable decided to go for Jhin, a champion that’s pretty infamous for his inability to win game fives. Diable even had an early advantage over Viper’s Caitlyn, but decided to go for defensive items and squandered all the headstart. And while Clear on his Kennen kept the team in the game for as long as he could, the game plan just fell apart slowly, and BLG dominated the objectives, never allowing BFX to take even one tower. With this win, BLG moves on to Group A’s Round 2.
G2 Esports and Team Secret Whales were deciding which team would go up against BLG. And while G2 managed to win 3:0, the games were anything but clean. BrokenBlade kept making mistakes while laning, even getting solokilled, but his game sense and Skewmond’s help always allowed him to come back. This is not something a player like Bin would ever allow, so G2’s toplaner definitely needs to tighten his gameplay up. Caps dominated in the first game on a favorable matchup, and then held his own and facilitated plays in games two and three. The standout player was Skewmond, who barely made any unforced errors, keeping a consistently high level.
And thus, BLG and G2 Esports meet yet again. This matchup feels as unavoidable as death and taxes. BLG leads 4:2 in the head-to-head, but G2 has actually won the last two matches. As for the losing teams, they will also play against each other. The loser will go home, while the winner will go up against the loser of the BLG vs G2 matchup.
Day 2 promises to be just as exciting, with Gen.G playing against JDG, and LOUD going against LYON.
