MSI 2021 Preview – Can MAD Lions keep up their recent form & will Cloud9 make it out of groups?
Let us take a look at all the participating teams at MSI 2021 and their groups to see who is the favorite and who is doomed to not make it out of groups.
The best players from every region have arrived in Europe and are invading European solo queue. It is currently unsafe to queue up as a one-trick pony as you will get punished twice as hard if your champion is banned. Why, You ask? It’s because the Mid-Seasonal Invitation is right around the corner!
Clear winner in group A
Group A will unfortunately be missing the Vietnamese representative as they can not travel due to COVID-19 restrictions. Although social media was calling for Karmine Corp to join, the recent European Masters winners, nothing of the sort will be happening. This leaves only three teams in the group. From the Oceanic region we have Pentanet.GG with names like Pabu and BioPanther. Both have played internationally before, but we recognize Pabu immediately by his rainbow haircut. He was also the runner-up at the All-Star 2018 Las Vegas 1v1 tournament, falling short against Caps. He will be a player to watch on this team.
Days left until #MSI2021 pic.twitter.com/gL7HxRP8dJ
— Royal Never Give Up (@RNGRoyal) May 3, 2021
Joining them are the Unicorns Of Love (UOL), a team known for their die-hard fans even back in the days when they played for the European LCS. However, the team with the most expectations in this group is Royal Never Give Up (RNG). After disappointing results, they finally found their way back to the top as their name might suggest. They never gave up and defeated the new generation of Chinese super players in the LPL-finals (FunPlus Phoenix) to return to the international stage once again.
We proudly present the winner team of the #LCL Spring Split 2021!#UOLWIN pic.twitter.com/QyzGZhJAu3
— Unicorns Of Love (@UnicornsOfLove) April 17, 2021
Predictions for this group will be that Royal Never Give Up will take the first seed followed by the Unicorns Of Love. Although RNG will be the big favorites, UOL still have a lot of experienced players who played at events like Worlds before. This will leave Pentanet.GG in third spot and not qualifying for the knockouts. They might, however, take a game off of one of these teams since underdogs always surprise at MSI.
Group B – The group of the dark horses?
Group B features the new European kings in MAD Lions. They bring with them high expectations since they brought down the reigning European and MSI champions in G2 Esports in the League of Legends European Championship (LEC). Joining them are teams from regions that bring huge fanbases with them. Both paiN Gaming and Ístanbul Wildcats, from Brazil and Turkey respectively, are known regions with huge fanbases. It will be nice to see all the interaction at MSI, but more importantly how they will perform.
Mark your calendars:
IT’S TIME TO #GOMAD AT #MSI2021 pic.twitter.com/YVPJ4hbPib
— LEC (@LEC) May 3, 2021
paiN Gaming faced quite some resistance in their regional league, playing 14 games before being crowned champions.Doublelift’s old rival brTT makes his return to the big stage and will be a player to watch to see how good he still is, since he is the oldest player attending at the age of 30. Ístanbul Wildcats will give HolyPhoenix another chance to prove himself internationally. They won the final against 1907 Fenerbahçe Esports with a convincing 3-1 score line to represent the Turkish region.
Lastly, we have not mentioned the fourth team in this group. They showed us at Worlds 2020 that they can be a force to be reckoned with and they will now try to prove once again that we should never underestimate the minor regions. It is none other than PSG Talon, a team that with substitute players already made a good run in an international event before.
Scrims are going _______ #PCS #MSI #ICICESTPARIS pic.twitter.com/aoHX2ThJST
— PSG TALON #MSI2021 (@PSG_Talon) May 4, 2021
Predictions for this group are quite hard. All teams have an equal shot at making it out as many of these players and teams still have a lot to prove for themselves. However, we cannot go around the fact that MAD Lions represent a major region and carry more expectations than others. That is why they are most certainly expected to make it out of groups. For the second spot we look more towards PSG Talon since they have more experience internationally than the others, but it would come as no surprise as another team takes the second spot.
Group C – Will Cloud9 make it out?
The last group, group C, contains the tournament’s favorite: DWG KIA. The current world champion has not lost form after winning the trophy, they have even improved more. It is not since SK Telecom were the most dominant team in the world that a defending world champion looked even better the next year. They are the big favorite coming into the tournament and should not be underestimated.
Who can possibly stop DWG KIA? Who can stop ShowMaker at a big competition?
Watch #MSI2021 on May 6-23 and find out if the LCK will Break Out.
📺 https://t.co/WwjZbVZdy2 pic.twitter.com/aIlMNoxz58— LCK Global (@LCK_Global) May 4, 2021
They find themselves in a group with the only returning reining MSI champion PerkZ on Cloud9. Perkz has shown regionally that he can bring North America to new highs, but can he carry that onto the international stage? He is known for being a leader in-game and will have to try his hardest to lead Cloud9 to a victory against DWG KIA in this group. Nevertheless, they will not be the only contenders as both DetonatioN FocusMe and Infinity Esports will try their hardest to leave their mark on this international event. It will be a David versus Goliath storyline but, like we said before, upsets do happen at MSI.
The reigning MSI champion is coming to defend the belt
— Luka (@C9Perkz) April 12, 2021
As far as predictions go, this group should be the clearest one to predict. Both DWG KIA and Cloud9 are the big favorite both coming from major regions. Especially with Cloud9 having multiple European Legends in their line-up and in their coaching staff. It is up to DetonatioN FocusMe and Infinity Esports to make this group as competitive as possible.
The Mid-Seasonal Invitation starts Friday the 14th of May with DWG KIA taking on Cloud9 in a banger of a first match.
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