Despite not being favored to win an international event for the first time in years, SK Telecom T1 star Lee "Faker" Sang-hyeok told ESPN's Tyler Erzberger that he is confident he can beat the tournament favorites, the ROX Tigers.

"When we didn't make it to the Korean finals during the summer split, our condition was very bad," Faker told Erzberger. "Over the course of time we've recovered, so if we play [ROX] in the tournament, I think we have a higher chance of beating them."

SKT is the first defending champion that the League of Legends World Championship has ever seen — no other winning team has returned to the tournament one year later until now — but most people were talking about the Tigers going into the event. The Tigers beat KT Rolster 3-2 to take the 2016 LCK Summer Playoffs and won the regular season with a 15-3 record.

The performance has also led many to poke holes in Faker's longstanding title as the best LoL player in the world. Team SoloMid's Soren "Bjergsen" Bjerg and the Tigers' Song "Smeb" Kyung-ho are both being floated in some circles as threats to Faker's throne, but Faker says he's not too worried.

"[Bjergsen] deserves the title of 'North American Faker,'" Faker told ESPN. "I am not at all offended by it. He's very much talented so it'll be [extremely] entertaining to face him in the tournament.

"I think Smeb is a very talented player, as well. But I don't consider him an absolutely overwhelming player, yet; [however] if he performs really well in this tournament he could become [one of the best]."

And when it comes to all-star players, Faker isn't SKT's only ace. Earlier today, the team ran Bae "Bengi" Song-woong as the starting jungler in their match against Cloud9.

Bengi hasn't started for SKT since the the regular season, and hasn't been their primary jungler since IEM in March. However, even though Bengi's dominant performance helped Faker achieve a solid 5/1/4 scoreline, Faker says he can play to the best of his ability not matter who's jungling for him.

"My style is that I adapt to my jungler," Faker told ESPN. "Bengi and [I] have a decent coordination and decent chemistry but it's [not] like it is special. He isn't the only one [I can excel alongside]."

Daniel Rosen is a news editor for theScore esports. You can follow him on Twitter.