League of Legends: What the 2020 MSI Field Would Have Looked Like

Oceania

The OPL champion is Legacy, who finished 18-3 and in first place during the regular season-ending the split on an eight-game winning streak. In the playoffs they defeated Chiefs and Dire Wolves by 3-1 scores to earn the title. This is their best finish in the OLP so far and quite the turnaround after going 1-20 last split. I would expect this team to try and get a couple upset wins and fight for a spot in the group stage.

Southeast Asia

The winner of the newly-formed PCS is Talon esports, who finished 13-5 and in third place during the regular season. This put them in the winner’s bracket of the tournament, where they won their first two matches. They lost their third match to Machi Esports to drop into the loser’s bracket. They won the final match of the loser’s bracket to set up a rematch with Machi, that they won 3-2 to become the champions.

This is a new team, but some of the players do have international experience, such as last seasons Hong Kong Attitude bottom lane duo of Ling “Kaiwing” Kai Wing  and Wong “Unified” Chun Kit reuniting to play for Talon this season. That international experience may have been an advantage over other teams making their MSI debuts.

However being that this is what is left of the former LMS and SEA, I don’t think the competition level is top-notch. I could see this team surprise a couple teams and maybe win a couple in the group stage of play-ins. Conversely, I could see this team be the worst one at the event, it just depends  on the skill gap between them and a few of the other wild card regions.

Turkey

The winner of the TCL is 1907 Fenerbahce. They were the top team in the TCL during the regular season at 13-3. They had a bye into the semi-finals, where they defeated team Aurora 3-2 to make it to the finals. In the finals they swept the Istanbul Wildcats 3-0 to become champions.

This team made it to last years MSI, with a completely different roster. During that tournament, they  4-2 in their play-in group, finishing second and failing to advance to the group stage. I would think that this team could contend at around that level, but I don’t think they would make the group stage.

Vietnam

The winner of the VCS is team Flash. Flash was the second-best team during the regular season at 10-4. This earned them the second spot in the stepladder for playoffs. They defeated Evos in the semi-finals and then Gam Esports in the finals to earn title and trip to MSI.

Vietnam seems to be one of the better minor regions, but they still haven’t placed super highly at an international event. I think realistically this team could have made it to the group stage of MSI, but I don’t see them making the top four.

It’s sad to have this tournament canceled, as it was set to have some great teams enter. I would still think G2 would be a strong pick to repeat, while SKT could challenge them to take the title back. I thought it still is worth noting all of these team’s success during the first split of the year.