As the Mid-Season Showdown is nearing its end, let’s take a look at Jesper “Zven” Svenningsen, who hopes to take Cloud9 all the way.
Europe has produced many talents of which many have stayed to compete in the LEC. Whenever someone makes an impressive international run, they often get scouted by other regions. The European players are no different to this and that is how our beloved and incredibly competitive marksman Jesper “Zven” Svenningsen ended up in the LCS. This is his story and how he rose to the top of Europe and became the first player to win both the LEC (previously EU LCS) and LCS.
Early career
Zven started gaming at the young age of 12 and was introduced to League of Legends by his teacher. Before League of Legends, Zven would play games like World of Warcraft and mostly focus on school. This is something he kept doing throughout the early phases of his professional gaming career. However, at a certain point, choices must be made. Zven pursued a professional career as a League of Legends player and is now one of the more decorated players from the West.
His first real team would be Tricked eSports where he played alongside the well-known Jesiz. They achieved some mediocre results, but nothing really stood out as they were not able to take home LAN victories or did not finish in the top three at an offline event. Zven’s first achievement would be on another team called “Intellectual Playground”. There he met up with Santorin and NeeGodbro.
Both were relatively known back then and are considered veterans nowadays. They managed to get second place at the WePlay LoL Invitational only losing in the finals against a professional SK Gaming line-up that had players competing (or who competed) in the LCS. After some time, having played for multiple teams on different events, he was eventually picked up by SK Gaming Prime. There he really started making a name for himself.
Original breakthrough
It wasn’t until 2015 that Zven got his first big shot. He joined up with xPeke to join the newly formed Origen line-up. Alongside xPeke himself he also met up with mithy in the botlane as his support. This line-up competed for a spot in the European League of Legends Championship Series (EU LCS) and had some fierce competition. Nevertheless, they only dropped a single game on route and easily secured their spot.
In his first split in the EU LCS, Zven amazed both friends and enemies with his Kalista and Corki play. He was behind a lot of Origen’s success and managed to guide the team to a top three ending in the regular split, even earning the “Outstanding Rookie of the 2015 Season EU LCS Summer Split” award.
Coming in second in play-offs playing the full five games against an incredibly strong Fnatic at the time, they had a good seeding for the European Regional Finals. There they would fight for a spot at Worlds, and this is where we could feel and see Zven’s hunger for success. Playing out of his mind, they eventually beat Team ROCCAT and the Unicorns of Love to make it. They would surprise the world by making it out of the group stage at Worlds as Europe’s third seed, even becoming the first Western team to win a best-of-five at a World Championship. They would eventually lose to the Worlds 2015 champions in SK Telecom T1.
Chasing success
After his successful run with Origen at Worlds 2015, Zven was even more hungry for a title. Starting for Origen again in 2016, they were unsuccessful in beating the new up- and coming G2 Esports roster from ocelote. With a little bit of frustration, he could also understand the dominance of this new G2 Esports roster, as they did what Origen were unable to do last year: making EU LCS and winning a title in the same year in a dominant fashion. Zven knew that “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em”, and joined G2 Esports for the latter half of the 2016 split. This was quite a controversial move considering the rivalry between the owners of Origen and G2 Esports, but it was the right one for Zven. He won the regional title and represented Europe as the first seed at Worlds 2016. Their run was cut short as they were unable to impress, placing 4th in their group.
The 2017 EU LCS saw a fairly dominant G2 Esports, but they were not unbeatable. Winning the EU LCS was nothing new but it was Zven’s first time at the Mid-Seasonal Invitation that year. Zven and G2 Esports looked a bit shaky but eventually managed to go all the way to the finals losing 1-3 against SK Telecom T1. When Worlds came around, expectations for the European squad, and Zven in particular, rose. Even though they had a better run than last year, they still did not make it out of groups.
The American Dream
Zven did not manage to add an international title to his name yet and decided to make another controversial move. Again with his partner in crime, mithy, he joined Team SoloMid for the upcoming NA LCS split. Unfortunately for Zven, it was not all rainbows and sunshine as he failed to make it to Worlds after some disappointing results. The results might have influenced the relationship between Zven and mithy, as they broke up as a duo when mithy returned to Europe and Zven stayed in North America. In the end, Zven made the right decision and as he joined Cloud9 he was able to win his first LCS split. This made him the first person to win a European and North American LCS split. Although he won that year, he still did not make it to Worlds and added yet another black stain to his record.
Reunited
Even though Zven never attended Worlds again after 2017, he is on his way to go this year. Reunited with old teammate Perkz in the midlane and now coach mithy, they are set to do some serious damage in the LCS. They finished second in the Lock-In tournament after only having a limited amount of practice and managed to end first in the regular spring split. This Cloud9 feels as dominant as Origen was back when they firstly joined the EU LCS.
Playoffs secured, time to int!
— Jesper “Zven” Svenningsen (@Zven) March 6, 2021
Zven has a long history, but a bright future ahead of him. He is a true legend in both the European and North American scene, and we cannot wait to see him shine on the international stage again.
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