Today marks the day of the first international tournament of the year for League of Legends E-Sports. Every year international tournaments pave the way to determine the best teams in the world. Winning one of these tournaments will not only solidify a team as the best in the world, but their region as well. This is why teams go out swinging, with the entire region on their back they must represent well. This year is no different, every year it seems that the 4 major regions Europe, North America, China, and Korea clash it out to determine the best one. Although other regions are represented at MSI as well, they don’t get anywhere close to the skill level the 4 major regions bring to the table.

Korea (SKT)- reigning from the undisputed best region in the world, they have a huge load to carry. Although the pressure is there, SKT is not new to this, as they have won the most international tournaments out of any team in the world. They are coming in with their new superstar roster and finally showing it off in a international tournament. After starting off slow, SKT demonstrated how scary their roster of players could be and beat the hyped up Griffin team. Coming into MSI, SKT are looking to show just how scary they can be and are considered contenders for the title.

China (IG)- IG is coming into the tournament hot with a Worlds win from last years Worlds tournament. Worlds is the best title any team can win, it is the biggest tournament of the year and only happens once a year. Just being able to represent your region at Worlds is considered a success, but IG won the whole thing. Since IG are hot going into MSI, they seem to be the favorites out of every team. Their 2 solo laners “TheShy” and “Rookie” are considered the best players in the world. Even if those 2 players are not playing so well, they still have insane players on the team to pick them up. IG is coming in as the favorites, but that doesn’t mean they are unstoppable.

Europe (G2)- This year, G2 added star mid laner “Caps” to their roster and moved their other star mid laner “Perkz” to the bottom lane. This roster move was a confusion to many, since they took one of the best mids in the region and put him into a new role. Although the community seemed confused, they knew exactly what they were doing. They dominated EU and it wasn’t even close. They manage to win 2 of their finals games in under 20 minutes, it was the fastest finals ever seen around the world. Going into MSI G2 are looking strong but recently their support player suffered a wrist injury, they are considering using their substitute support. Their support player was a vital role in this teams success since he made up for the inexperience in the bottom lane. If G2 decide to play their support, they look to be able to pull an upset on the top 2 Asian regions.

North America (TL)- TL is looking the weakest out of the 4 major regions. TL played a close finals against TSM and was barely able to pull it out with a reverse sweep. The wins they got were off of TSM making mistakes and not TL making outplays. This is a problem going into MSI since the other major regions play the game almost as perfect as can be, the odds of them making a mistake to let TL back into the game is slim. TL added 2 star players to their roster to make up for their lack of success at last years MSI. Their 2 new players are gonna be pivotal to this teams success, they come in with a good record internationally, especially with their support player “CoreJJ” who won a world championship. This liquid team has the players to make it far in the tournament, it just comes down to if they can play the game as cleanly as a team like the other 4 major regions.