Gaming
New contenders rose up to challenge for the trophy in the 2020 LEC Summer Season, but in the end, G2 Esports proved that they’re still the best team in Europe. They’ve now won four titles in a row, and are heading back to the League of Legends World Championship to try and go one better than they did last year, and win the entire thing.
G2’s midlaner Rasmus ‘Caps’ Winther was their star man during the Summer Season and playoffs, and his performances earned him the MVP award. We caught up with him to look back at the summer, and find out his thoughts ahead of Worlds.
“It feels good, we’ve won a lot of titles in a row and obviously every title is important,” says Caps. G2 have now won eight European titles, more than any other team; not only are they the only team to have won four in a row, they’ve now done it twice during their history.
“More than anything though, I want to show off internationally,” he says. “Winning the Mid-Season Invitational [2019] felt really good, and I’m hoping we can show up at Worlds.”
G2 looked like they were going to win everything possible in 2019. They won both LEC seasons, MSI, and then stormed their way to the Worlds final, only to come up short at the last hurdle against FunPlus Phoenix.
It hasn’t been all plain sailing this year though. In 2019 they were almost untouchable, but at times this year G2 have had their problems. In the end, it doesn’t matter as long as they’re winning.
“I think we had a rough split,” Caps admits. “It feels good that we made it and that I got MVP again. It doesn’t really matter how dominant we are, it’s just about the wins. We got wins in Europe in both splits. Now we’re going to Worlds and hoping we have a good showing. Hopefully I can have an MVP performance at Worlds too. Europe may not be at its strongest right now, but we’ve got plenty of time before Worlds to adapt to the meta and see if we can counter it and get ahead of everybody else.”
G2 have long been innovators, and it’s their versatility and adaptability that often gives them the edge over their opponents. After a loss to Fnatic in the Summer Playoffs, they went back to the drawing board and came back through the lower bracket stronger than before. They were tested in a five-game thriller against Rogue in the semi-final, which was a worry going into the final rematch against Fnatic the very next day.
“It didn’t give us momentum,” says Caps. “We were a bit tired, but it wasn’t really a problem. It’s hard to say. For sure we learned a lot from the series against Rogue about ourselves and the meta. More than momentum, we learned things that we can hopefully use at Worlds, and we did use some of those things in the finals.”
Revenge was on the cards for G2 in the Summer Final. They’ve had the beating of Fnatic over the past couple of years, so the loss earlier in the playoffs stung a bit. They needed to prove that they are still the top dogs in the region. Straight after their defeat, G2 studied Fnatic, saw what they were doing, and found the way to counter it.
“Fnatic never change too much, and they don’t adapt,” says Caps. “We got caught off guard in the first series where they won against us, since they actually did change. That gave us a week to learn about their new playstyle, but then we adapted and proved that we are stronger.”
G2 came out strong in the first game of the final, but Fnatic kept at it during the second game. G2 looked to have thrown the game away, with Fnatic taking a big lead, but against the odds, G2 came back and won in a nailbiter. At that point, G2 appeared to have the mental edge, and the series looked like it was going to go the same way as in the Spring Season, a 3-0 sweep.
“We were definitely very confident being 2-0 up against Fnatic,” says Caps. “Once we get the advantage in a series, it feels like it’s hard for them to come back and we’re good at closing it out.”
They did exactly that in the next game, securing Europe’s first seed going into Worlds. With more titles under their belt, G2 are feeling confident.
“I think we can win the whole thing this year,” Caps says. “I’ve come close two times before and we’ve won MSI. It just depends on how we perform and how we read the meta. We’ll need to show up when it really matters.”
G2 always believe they can win, but Caps knows that there are still a lot of scary teams from other regions at the championships this year.
“We’re mainly worried about the LPL teams,” he says. “The LCK has also been looking dangerous too. Top Esports have a great midlaner who looks really dangerous. But we have to focus on the group stage before we worry about other teams, as we have Suning and Machi Esports to deal with, and likely Team Liquid if they make it out of Play-Ins.”
Caps only has a few parting words for his Worlds opponents, but they’re potent: “Good luck. We’re going to come in hard at Worlds and show our best, so you best be prepared for that.”