League of Legends: How every LEC team should improve in the offseason

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Origen – Support

An excellent return to life in the top division of European League of Legends was quickly extinguished in the Summer Split as Origen went from definite Worlds contenders to missing out on playoffs in a matter of months. One of the most shocking collapses in EU history resulted in this super-team lacking an identity and unable to find answers in the final few weeks of the 2019 season, failing to overcome Splyce in the Regional Finals.

You could argue that multiple factors were involved in Origen’s downfall including the inability to match lofty expectations from an impressive Spring Split, fatigue setting in after Rift Rivals, and an unfavorable meta for OG’s patient approach to games that may have been figured out by their EU rivals.

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It could have also boiled down to the players overachieving in Spring or underperforming in Summer as Jonas “Kold” Andersen was a shadow of his former self and looked incapable of controlling the jungle in the early game, despite doing so consistently in the early stages of the season. Similarly, Erlend “Nukeduck” Våtevik Holm, once praised for having a champion ocean and endless counter-picks, became an easily-bullied solo laner, often dwarfed by LEC rookies and completely losing command of his lane.

However, if we were to pick out one single member of Origen that should be moved along for the team to move onto bigger and better things in 2020, it would have to be Alfonso “Mithy” Aguirre Rodríguez. The three-time EU LCS champion is a proven talented support player and intelligent shot-caller with years of experience under his belt, but in the current competitive climate, supports are crucial in setting up plays and providing key crowd control for bruisers and assassins to play around.

When it comes to European support players, you simply have to look at the likes of Mikyx, Hylissang, and Norskeren to understand how a support should act in all stages of the game and how it’s no longer about vision control and shot-calling. Nowadays, a support needs to control the bottom lane and know when to roam around the map to create advantages with his jungle and mid laner. This is an area where Mithy struggled in the Summer Split.

Whether it’s due to Origen’s slow, patient approach to games, or just Mithy’s reluctance to leave his lane, this team clearly struggle to create advantages in the early game as evidenced by their -295 gold difference at fifteen minutes, 33% first blood percentage, and 39% first tower percentage. This could be explained by the team’s 39% win ratio during the Summer Split, but it’s also a sign of how OG is struggling to build a gold lead in the early stages.

Regardless, the coaching staff have a tough task on their hands as they seek to recapture the form of the Spring Split while also putting the disastrous Summer Split behind them. Keeping all five players on the roster is an absolutely fine decision to make, but please at the very least bring in some substitutes in case things continue to go poorly.

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