The League of Legends World Championship Swiss Stage has kicked off, but T1 did not have the debut most fans expected.
LoL Worlds 2023 have been pretty exciting, with one of the most insane play-in stages we've seen in a long time thanks to the change in format this year and more best of three games getting played. This meant that every match mattered.
Now that Team BDS and GAM Esports have made it to the next round, it's time to follow the Swiss Stage action. T1 and Team Liquid kicked off the action on October 19, but T1 fans did not expect a start like the one they got – especially against the third seed of NA.
LoL Worlds 2023: T1 Faced Team Liquid In Dicey Match
This is the first time we are going to see the Swiss format at a League of Legends World Championship. Riot have changed it up in hopes of giving fans more best-of-series, rather than the boring and outdated best-of-one format we had before.
| 💡What is a Swiss Format? Swiss format is a tournament structure where participants are not eliminated; instead, they face opponents with a similar record. It ensures fair competition by matching winners against winners and losers against losers, gradually determining final rankings through multiple rounds. |
Team Liquid might not have won their first match of the 2023 League of Legends World Championship, but they did have an insane start to the tournament, with an insanely strong early game against the most well-known org from South Korea.
HUPU ratings for T1 vs TL:Zeus gets a 9.6, while Oner gets a 2.9Pyosik gets a 10 for his Lee sin performance, and Yeon only gets a 2.2#LCK #LCS #T1WIN #TLWIN #Worlds2023 pic.twitter.com/6schgNIIOR
— HUPU Esports (@HupuEsports) October 19, 2023
Especially the 2022 League of Legends World Champion, Hong "Pyosik" Chang-hyeon looked great on Lee Sin, with fans on HUPU giving him a 10 point rating, while his lane opponent Mun "Oner" Hyeon-jun was criticized especially harshly, only earning a 2.9.
The community also wasn't impressed with this game from T1. Fans seem pretty unhappy with T1's drafting and many felt that the ending of the match was quite anticlimactic, with Yeon messing up the teamfight in the 35th minute, which led to TL's downfall.
So, while T1 did manage to rake in the win, it seems to have only been thanks to a mistake from Team Liquid which T1 capitalized on. Overall, T1 looked quite shaky throughout the game, losing two Barons to Team Liquid as well. Fans are worried about T1's form, hoping that they won't spiral into another down at the most crucial time of the year.
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