Cloud9 vs. Gen.G - Worlds 2021 Quarterfinals Preview
The 2021 League of Legends World Championship has been nothing short of exciting, with various historical moments to keep track of. Storylines such as the LJL reaching the tournament’s group stage for the first time, the LCK’s return to dominance with all of their teams getting past the group stage, Cloud9 shocking everyone by making it out of their group and the first four-way tie in Worlds’ history. The tournament’s post-group stage play might have a chance to put these all to shame.
One of the tournament quarterfinals will be housing a matchup between Korea’s Gen.G and North America’s Cloud9. Both of these teams could have not had such a different path on their way past the group stage.
Cloud9 got placed into the group stage’s Group A. This group had two of the tournament favourites and previous world champions right off the bat in Korea’s DAMWON Kia and China’s FunPlus Pheonix. The group was rounded out by Europe’s Rogue who weren’t a pushover either. This structuring made it really tough-looking for the American representatives going into play, and it showed to be true in the first round-robin.
Once in the second round-robin though, that began to change. The team began to show some life, punished a FunPlus Phoenix team that could not muster up a win in that same round-robin and put themselves in the position to get through. A win in a tiebreaker over Rogue sealed the deal and got them to the place the organisation has never failed to make.
On the other hand, Gen.G looked to be the dominant force in the first round-robin of their group D. This group contained China’s LNG Esports who came from play-ins, North America’s Team Liquid and Europe’s MAD Lions. For all intents and purposes, this was the “Group of Death” and the end result showed that to be true.
The end result was a four-way tie in which Gen.G defeated Team Liquid for a guaranteed quarterfinals spot and later took down MAD Lions for the first seed.
Cloud9 vs. Gen.G - The matchup
Drawing Gen.G could have possibly been the best possible outcome for the North American representatives. A team that although showed dominance and has been known to be a tough wall for any non-Western team, showed some cracks in their armour in their willingness to lose themselves their own games. An aggressive Cloud9 can take advantage of that.
Speaking of Cloud9’s aggressiveness, this is what has defined the team at this tournament - they live and die by it. Most of their losses came through in part by their want to be risky when it wasn’t necessary. But at the same time, this thought process is what gets them wins in the first place as it garners them powerful early game leads. If Cloud9 wants to take Gen.G down, this is the way to do it. Find that early game lead and transition into solid mid-games.
Click to enlargeOn the other hand, if there’s one team that can punish this type of playstyle, it’s Gen.G. The Korean representatives are the quintessential “play it safe and wait until your enemies mess up style”. On top of that, mid-laner Gwak “Bdd” Bo-seong has been playing at a supremely high level, being one of the main contributors to their wins thus far. Gen.G can also add their very potent early-game picks and strong vision control that allows them to take the early skirmishes - a perfect counter for an early-game focused Cloud9.
At the end of the day, this matchup will come down to the early game as Cloud9 heavily relies upon it going well in their favour while Gen.G relies on it to neutralise their enemies.
