League of Legends MSI: Three reasons Liquid was lucky to beat Phong Vũ Buffalo

Naul was a non-factor

I don’t know if there was a player whose stats got padded more than PVB mid laner Naul in this series. Despite going 2/1/8, 3/3/2, and 5/4/4, Naul was incredibly un-impressive during the series. He was basically non-existent in terms of damage contributions, especially in key moments.

In Game 1 of the series, Naul did play quite well in some fights around dragon in the early game, dipping in and deleting carries as Leblanc. By the 20-minute mark, he was rolling at 1/0/6, poised to carry the game. Then, the carry inexplicably stopped.

In a crucial fight at the 23-minute mark, Naul did no damage to key Liquid carries Doublelift, Jensen, and Impact as they whittled down his teammates with poke. Then, he inexplicably decided to flash over the wall then use his W – Distort into TL, leaving him cut off from the rest of his team and easily killed. That lost fight gave TL an opening to take Baron, which would basically decide the game.

In Game 2 on Zoe, Naul was out-damaged by every other player in the game other than the supports while playing Zoe, which is almost impossible. He missed several key skill shots that could have decided fights. For instance, he completely whiffed a Q – Paddle Star in a Liquid four-man collapse at the 10-minute mark with Impact and CoreJJ both at or below half-health.

Then, just before the 14-minute mark, Naul bailed on an ill-advised dive top by his team but compounded the error by following the roam, missing all his skill shots on Impact, dying, and giving over a shutdown to Liquid. Later, he missed a critical bubble while Meliodas decided to re-engage a fight after mid outer tower fell. Meliodas died but had the bubble hit Naul might have had enough damage to at least kill Xmithie, who limped away from the fight.

In Game 3, though, Naul actually did get fed thanks to a very messy early-game invade and some very nice out-plays in some mid-game skirmishes. At 5/2/4 on Ryze at the 20-minute mark, Naul was in a prime position to carry the game.

Then, at 20 minutes PVB won a skirmish around their mid tower, killing Impact and Xmithie. Unfortunately, his team made a pretty questionable call to take an early baron with no really strong damage dealer on their side (they could have easily taken the top and/or mid outer towers instead to bring the gold deficit closer and even gotten an Ocean Drake).

But as TL collapsed on them with the three remaining members, Naul inexplicably ran away from his team to get isolated out and killed, granting a huge window for Liquid to take Baron Nashor. Had he stayed with his team, Liquid may have been forced to chase the whole team and delayed long enough to stop a counter-Baron take (which they eventually got).

Finally, in the game-deciding fight, Naul again separated himself from his team to get soloed out and killed, effectively ending the fight, game, and series. Yes, Palette had been caught and killed at that point, but Liquid couldn’t feel confident going in with that fed Ryze still alive. Once Naul put himself in a position to get caught alone and die, TL was able to dog-pile onto the rest of PVB and end the game.