G2 Esports looks shaky in 2020 LEC debut against MAD Lions

Jan 25, 2020

Reading time: 2 min

G2 Esports opened the 2020 LEC Spring season with a victory over MAD Lions.

The 2019 World Championship finalist was in charge of welcoming the new organization to the league. MAD built an interesting roster in the off-season that includes mid laner Marek “Humanoid” Brázda and various talent from the regional circuit.

G2 kept the same roster from 2019, but with a twist. Luka “Perkz” Perković is back in the mid lane and Rasmus “Caps” Winther is on bottom lane duty. When G2 first announced the role swap, fans were confused by the decision.

G2 got to test its experiment against MAD, but the results are not as promising as the team might have expected. Caps, despite his prowess in the mid lane, didn’t look as good as Perkz did when he first changed roles. G2 can afford to play with a weak bottom lane in the LEC, but that won’t fly once the team makes it to international competition.

G2 stumbles in 2020 LEC Spring debut

MAD dominated the early game thanks to the constant moves from jungler Zhiqiang “Shadow” Zhao. Shadow didn’t score kills, but his presence was enough to keep G2 from getting aggressive. Seven minutes into the match, MAD pulled the trigger and secured three quick kills, which was followed by two more.

G2 had to finish the laning phase as fast as possible. Now playing from behind, G2 couldn’t face MAD on even terms and hope to get back on top. The strategy was to group as three and try to find the picks around the map.

That change in pace threw MAD completely off balance.

Humanoid was out of sync with the rest of his team. The mid laner engaged in fights without backup and was positioned poorly on the map. Even when they were together, MAD Lions hesitated to take action and couldn’t take contested objectives.

G2 picked up on MAD’s hesitation and decided to force as many team fights as possible. Every time G2 started and won a fight, the team claimed more space on the map. MAD ended up crumbling under the pressure and G2 took the opening game of the season.