LEC 2019: LEC Week 2 is looking spicy!
By Michael Salt
Game to watch – Day 1 – Game 5: Origen vs Misfits Gaming
Closing Day 1 of Week 2 we have one of the most hyped matches of the week. The 2-0 Misfits will be looking to punish their wayward son Barney “Alphari” Morris for making his way over to Origen’s top lane, a position once held by their own sOAZ.
It’s the matchup in the top lane that I’ll be paying the closest attention to. When you look at the functions that each Alphari & sOAZ both serve in their respective teams, it’s easy to draw parallels between both playstyles and champion pools. Neither one is renowned for their carry picks, however, they’re both fantastically smart laners and perfectly execute the engage-tank roles on their teams. I get a very master vs apprentice vibe and it remains to be seen who’ll be the one with the high ground at the end.
In the middle lane, we have two veterans of the European scene duking it out. Fabian “Febiven” Diepstraten returning from his miserable year in NA and Erlend “Nukeduck” Våtevik Holm hungrier than ever after being on the cusp of the 2018 Summer EU LCS Championship. Neither one is known for getting themselves caught out, so when analysing this matchup you should really be taking into account their jungle duo partners.
Between Jonas “Kold” Andersen and Nubar “Maxlore” Sarafian, I think it’d be fair to say that Maxlore is widely considered to be the more mechanically sound and better pathing jungler. However since Kold has never found himself in the greatest company team-wise I don’t think it’d be fair to completely discount him yet, let’s wait and see what he can do with stronger (and smarter) laners.
The bottom lane is really where this game will be decided. All Patrik and Mithy need to do keep Misfits bot lane duo Steven “Hans Sama” Liv and Kang “GorillA” Beom-hyeon from snowballing and spilling that lead across the map. This first starts with not letting Hans Sama get his hands on his signature Draven pick, and maybe keep Alistar and Rakan out of GorillA’s hands too since his engages in week 1 were absolutely disgusting.
Despite thinking Origen are completely capable of winning this game, I think the bot lane steam-train of GoHan will plow through Mithy & Patrik before Nukeduck and Kold even get a chance to stem the bleeding. So today I’m giving the win to Misfits Gaming.