The Ups and Downs of the Worlds Groups Stage

The Chinese and South Korean teams were the clear winners in the Worlds Group Stage, while most Western teams - and second LPL seed Top Esports - had to leave disappointed.

After eight days of games, the Worlds Group Stage ended last weekend, confirming the eight playoff teams. Previously, we decided to hazard a preliminary judgement on who was doing well and who was not. Now that we have had more time to go over it, well, some of those calls were premature. So how does it look now that we have had several days to look back at the group stage?

The Good: LCK and (Most of) LPL 

• T1: The LCK in general deserves to be here, but T1 impressed us the most with how they bounced back from a rough loss to deliver possibly the best performance in week 2. They easily won the rematch with DFnatic and leave the group with a comportable 5-1 record. More intestestingly, they have shaped up in their drafting too, playing around Choi "Zeus" Woo-je as he delivered a stellar performance

• JD Gaming: The LPL champions looked on point in group B and are one of the favorites for the title. Sometimes, they would start slow but time and again, they gook over the mid-game. The western representative Evil Geniuses and G2 Esports proved to be little challenge. Their big rivals in the group DWG KIA fought hard and managed to get to a tiebreaker, JD Gaming took the win with an amazing game which showcased their top laner Bai "369" Jia-Hao as one of the potential MVPs at Worlds.

• RNG: After having their up and down moments in the Play-In, Royal Never Give Up took it up a notch (or three) in the groups. The team went smashed 100 Thieves and CFO and went 1:1 with the LCK champions before losing the tiebreaker - and  judging by how some of the players looked, they weren't at their best that day. When they are in peak condition, RNG can be a dark horse team this tournament.

The Bad:  TES, G2 and the LCS

• G2 Esports: We considered adding Fnatic here as well, but Fnatic barely squaked in through playoff and looked shaky to begin with, which made us be a bit more lenient.Pus, they have the win against T1 and good week 1 to keep them warm. T1 went from an up and down team at MSI to a mostly down team at Worlds. The squad seemed to never fire on all cylinders and their loss to EG - the first for the year after seven consecutive wins - was richly deserved.

• LCS: While the NA representatives improved their standing from a 0-9 to a 3-6 in week 2, this still accounts for their worst Worlds performance so far. While the victories against LEC rivals felt good to NA fans, the fact is that for the first time in a very long time not a single NA team is in playoffs - and it was not close. The LCS underperformed, that's hard to deny.

• Top Esports: While the ending of the game against GAM Esports will be discussed for a while yet, the fact remains this was only the final nail in the coffin for Top's playoff chances. It has become almost a tradition for one LPL team to fail in group, and in week 1 we saw Top lose to both Rogue and Gen.G before their fateful game versus GAM. Sadly, it is a poor showing for the LPL's second seed.

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The top 8 teams of Worlds head into the playoffs, with the first match pitting Rogue against JD Gaming on Thursday, October 20th from 11 PM CEST. Will Rogue once more come up clutch when it counts, or will the LPL champtions eliminate the last Western team on their way to the semifinal?