After several weeks of absence, Dexter has finally resolved his Visa issues and has come back from Europe to rejoin NA League of Legends team Counter Logic Gaming. I've been keeping up with their progress these first few weeks with various subs, including the much-touted return of HotshotGG and former support Chauster--both taking up the mid lane role while Link is relegated to the jungle. Their results have understandably been rather mixed, but HotshotGG's Nidalee play was impressive as always, and Chauster's Yasuo and Ziggs play was actually very good--definitely at a pro level. I think if Chauster had been a career mid laner he would have done very well for himself.
However, with Link back in the mid lane and Dexter back in the jungle, it was time for CLG to prove themselves. Although they have picked up a few wins with substitute players, they've repeatedly reminded viewers that they are much stronger with their official roster. It might be too early to say that for sure just yet, but today they picked up a very impressive win against Evil Geniuses on a roster of reasonably familiar champions. Probably the only uncommon pick was Doublelift's Sivir. Doublelift has always been a player that is partial to more mechanically-intensive AD carry picks but in this particular case he picked (likely with guidance from couch MonteCristo) what was best for the team. Sivir's On the Hunt was a great boon to the team, enabling Link's LeBlanc, Dexter's Vi, and Nien's Shyvana to repeatedly dive EG's backline.
Things were not going well in the beginning of the game in the top lane, however. Nien, once a career AD carry player, has often been criticized for not playing the top lane role at a professional level. In this particular game, he employed a strategy he has often used before in which he starts Doran's Blade in the Shyvana vs. Mundo matchup in an effort to either secure an early kill or push his opponent out of lane. Although a first blood was very much within his grasp, Snoopeh's excellent map presence on Olaf prevented him from snagging the kill and instead he went down instead. Only about 40 seconds later, Snoopeh came back up to the top lane and secured yet another kill, momentarily pushing Nien's Shyvana out of the game.
Although these two early kills must have been demoralizing for CLG, it didn't stop the rest of the team from continuing to pressure. Although Link's Leblanc was bullied early by Pobelter's Orianna, he eventually roamed bottom and made a play with Dexter's Vi on EG's bottom lane. Although Krepo's Alistar play was fantastic in this game at denying several engages, the overall team play of Counter Logic Gaming was too much for one player to suppress. With Vi's Assault and Battery, Leblanc's Distortion, Thresh's hook, Shyvana's Dragon's Rage, and Sivir's On the Hunt, CLG were able to repeatedly wombo combo EG's lineup into oblivion.
In the postgame interview, Doubelift confessed the Sivir pick was a response to his perception that EG's bottom lane plays relatively passively. He felt that the champion's laning phase was not strong--but he was confident he could easily farm against his opponents and scale into late game while becoming an incredible asset to his team. I think I agree with his assessment, despite Krepo's many attempts to make plays. As has been the case since the CLG.EU days, Yellowpete has never been the kind of AD carry to impress with flashy plays. He is often reliable but does nothing for the team when they fall behind. Krepo on the other hand has become a playmaker. Unfortunately for him, his teammate seems to be lagging behind.
Although CLG dominated this matchup, it's easy to see that EG is a promising team. Snoopeh's early game pressure was very impressive, and Krepo's mechanics on Alistar were actually top notch. Innox escaped a great deal of sticky situations with his annoyingly tanky Mundo. If anything, the often inconsistent Pobelter underperformed on Orianna, and Yellowpete again failed to make an impression with his AD carry play--on a champion that is known to completely take over games. Yellowpete reminds me a bit of Cop's old play style when he frequently played Miss Fortune. In Cop's case, he took the fan criticism to heart and completely revamped his playstyle to become one of the best carries in North America. I can only hope Yellowpete eventually follows suit.
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