League of Legends Recap

EU LCS

Much like their NA counterparts Fnatic solidified their spot in the 2018 World Championship with a second consecutive EU LCS Championship title of their own.

Fnatic’s story this split began with a bit of a twist. Due to the insanity of the meta Rekkles was subbed out in favor of the team’s top lane sub Bwipo in week 2. Risking losing games while Rekkles learned champions he had never played at the professional level was not in the cards for Fnatic or Rekkles himself. Bwipo knew these champs. He even had professional stage experience on them. Rekkles did not and therefore agreed to be benched for a majority of the Summer Split.

Despite lacking one of their most iconic players at the helm Fnatic blew away expectations. Where they were expected to fail, they flourished. Instead of crumbling under the weight of a brand new, barely practiced bot duo, they soared. Fnatic found their stride both in the meta and as a team. Eventually victory after victory led Fnatic to the top of the EU LCS. And after a full 6 weeks of Bwipo starting in the bot lane Fnatic finally swapped Rekkles back into their roster full time. With their star ADC back in the driver’s seat Fnatic escaped tie breakers, in part thanks to a Vitality victory over G2, and ended the season in sole possession of first place. Thus earning themselves a Quarterfinals bye.

During their bye week preparations, with a little help from Misfits winning their Quarterfinals series against G2, Fnatic became the first EU LCS team to qualify for the 2018 World Championship in Korea. The team then used this qualification as momentum in their Semifinals series.

Fnatic’s Semifinals series against Misfits was a bloody one to say the least. Each game clocked 20 or more kills with the first game of the series showcasing a lot of back and forth action between the two teams. Ultimately Fnatic dictated the fast pace of this first game successfully and closed it out rather quickly. Misfits did manage to win game two and keep the series close, but Fnatic stayed enough ahead to take the series 3-1.

Finally, Fnatic had made it to another Finals. This Finals, much like their Spring Finals series against G2, was not a total slam dunk on the side of Fnatic. Schalke started the series off with an unusually early game focused win against Fnatic. Despite their best efforts, however, this year was not meant to be the year of Nukeduck. Mirroring their Semifinals series against Misfits, sOAZ was subbed in for Bwipo once Schalke took game one. Fnatic proceeded to take the remainder of the series 3-1 with relative ease and were crowned the 2018 EU LCS Summer Split Champions.