Chapter 518

The team introduction segment ended, six huge team flags were raised high above the stage, all players and coaches of the six strong teams participating in the main stage of this year's Mid-Season Championship had already taken the stage, and if ranked by audience popularity, their order is as follows:

EU: G2,

LPL: VG,

NA: TSM,

LCK: KT,

GPL: GAM,

LMS: FW,

Many people were surprised, why is GAM's popularity higher than that of the Flash Wolves? Both are teams that came up from the play-in stage, and obviously the Flash Wolves look stronger.

Actually, it's not hard to understand.

You have to know, this is Ba Xi.

And the Ba Xi region is also one of the Wildcard Regions.

Wildcard Region viewers will definitely be more willing to support Wildcard Region teams, let alone GAM, which almost knocked out TSM and looks like a dark horse at first glance.

Besides, putting aside the wildcard reason, in fact even the LPL audience supports GAM more. You ask why? They just love to watch the excitement, no matter how big it gets!

Loving to watch excitement is the nature of Chinese people!

After the opening ceremony ended, the non-opening-match teams left the stage and went back to their respective resting rooms backstage, with only two teams left on the stage.

The first match of the group stage in the 2017 MSI main event began between G2 and KT.

The group stage used a round-robin Bo1 format, with six teams advancing to four; after two rounds of matches, the top four teams by points advanced to the knockout stage. The entire group stage lasted five days, with each team playing ten Bo1 matches, averaging two per day.

Moreover, this MSI used the 7.8 patch updated at the end of April, and the two new champions Xayah and Rakan were both banned from selection.

At 3:30 PM, the first match officially began.

KT intended to borrow last year's Worlds champion G2's prestige, and right out of the gate they threw out an extremely fierce composition: top lane Renekton, jungle Mang Seng, mid lane grasshopper, bot lane Varus + Miss Fortune, and this Varus took the Lightning rune, clearly aiming to go against the meta with armor‑penetration items, seeking maximum burst.

This is not an LCK‑style composition, but KT used this lineup to beat SKT in the LCK Spring Finals, having undergone strict vetting.

On the other side, G2's chosen composition is relatively stable, similar to the one VG used when they faced WE in the LPL playoffs semifinals: top lane Galio, jungle Graves, mid lane Ekko, bot lane Ashe + Karma.

G2's Galio was first‑picked, so KT later picked Renekton as a counter.

G2's mid lane matchup was similarly uncomfortable; short‑range Ekko facing the grasshopper, a champion strong at wave clear and harassment, felt quite rough, but the discomfort only lasted the first few minutes—once Ekko could clear the backline minions with a single Q, the grasshopper's good days were over. Moreover, Ekko only needed to build a small magic resist cloak to stop the grasshopper from flashing in and ulting together with Mang Seng for a full combo kill on him; as long as the enemy mid/jungle couldn't kill Ekko instantly, thanks to Ekko's ultimate's special mechanic, his advantage in subsequent fights would be huge. In team fights, he mainly serves to bring Galio in, acting as the target for Galio's ultimate, granting him the same damage reduction effect as Galio's W—making even a pure damage build very tanky, not to mention he also has Zhonya's Hourglass to buy time.

In short, this match was a spear‑vs‑shield clash; both sides ran mid‑game‑focused compositions, but KT's lineup stressed the edge in small‑scale fights, whereas G2's lineup stressed 5v5 team‑fight coordination, and the early aggressor was inevitably KT, having chosen the more proactive jungler.

From the outset of this match, KT bared its fangs: Mang Seng took both buffs and swiftly triple‑ganked top, killing Expect's Galio; Renekton secured first blood, then cleared a wave before heading back, and upon returning to lane the top lane matchup was already skewed.

Meanwhile, G2 jungler Jankos fought back in mid lane, joining Perkz to whittle down the grasshopper; the two then grouped and rushed bot for a 4‑2 dive, killing KT's support Miss Fortune, and Perkz claimed the kill.

Both sides reacted almost perfectly to this exchange: after Perkz secured the kill, he instantly teleported top to guard the tower and farm, whereas KT had the grasshopper return to base to replenish, then teleported bot to assist in defense.

The match grew tense and exciting, and the crowd burst into repeated exclamations.

And the overall performance G2 showed in this round also left KT's members secretly startled—such a tightly interlinked, rigorous tactic is nothing like the Ou Mei teams they know!

Around six minutes in, at the crucial moment when both sides' mid laners hit level six, KT again took the initiative, with Score's Mang Seng accompanied by the Fat General grasshopper once more moving top to attempt a tower dive to kill Galio.

But this time KT's move was read by G2; Jankos counter‑ganked early, and together with the subsequently arriving Perkz they formed a surround on the three KT players tower‑diving.

KT fought desperately, relying on pure execution, and still managed to kill Expect, while two of them escaped with low health.

Nonetheless, this exchange was a loss for KT, since Perkz had only arrived after pushing an extra wave, and Pawn, already low on health from the fight, after helping clear the enemy minions that had shoved up to the tower in top lane needed to recall to replenish and could not return straight to mid lane, causing the mid‑lane turret to lose two waves of minions.

Plus Perkz's bot‑lane kill and top‑lane assist, together with over ten extra last hits, the mid‑lane matchup soon displayed a noticeable equipment disparity.

KT did not pay enough attention to the emerging mid‑lane gap, placing too much faith in Pawn's laning and underestimating Perkz's ability.

After the second exchange ended, both sides resumed normal laning.

Around eight minutes in, the director hastily switched to a mid‑lane view; Perkz's Ekko jumped in and traded blows, exchanging half a health bar with the grasshopper, and at the same time he secured lane pressure.

Meanwhile, Jankos aggressively invaded KT's jungle, entangling around the second red buff with Score's Mang Seng.

The director then cut the view to the jungle.

More than ten seconds later, a sudden change occurred in mid lane.

When this announcement appeared on the venue's big screen, the crowd burst into a deafening exclamation.

The director cut to mid lane at the instant the announcement appeared, but all that was visible was Ekko's health bar leaving the tower's attack range; the precise kill process remained unknown.