* Courtesy of Riot Games

Even Counter-Logic Gaming fans would admit, CLG did not look to be in top form in their quarterfinal match against Team Envyus.

With CLG taking the win 3–2 against NV, there comes a myriad of questions as to whether CLG stand a chance against their upcoming opponents of Immortals. Many had expected CLG to win the quarterfinal series 3–0 or at worst 3–1, but the game proved to be a roller-coaster of emotions for CLG. In Game 1, CLG were able to pull the win out through the combination of a clutch baron steal @23:25 from Omar “OmarGod” Amin and failure of maintaining objective control by the NV squad, but it’s difficult to rely on such heavy mistakes from the stronger Immortals lineup.

Trevor “Stixxay” Hayes and Zaqueri “Aphromoo” Black might be a legitimate concern, with Games 1, 2, 3 and 4 going heavily in favor of Apollo “Apollo” Price and Nickolas “Hakuho” Surgent. Now, it should be noted that Varus is a great early game champ for harass and should typically beat a lot of scaling ADCs for lane dominance, but the lead was so significant that it became apparent it was perhaps due to player performance issues rather than champion limitations. Even in Game 1, with Apollo on Caitlyn versus Stixxay’s Tristana, the CLG bot lane got bullied out of lane through a good early trade, forcing Stixxay back early to get a pickax, meanwhile Apollo was able to delay his back timing for the traditional BF sword. Hakuho continued to lead the charge in the bot lane for the entirety of the series, landing hook after hook and shutting down any chance for CLG to take good trades. With these bot lane leads, NV were able to transition this power into the jungle for Lira.

Lira displayed constant pressure onto the CLG rookie OmarGod from the start of Game 1. Lira was able to invade towards the bot side because of the massive lane pressure that NV’s bot lane exuded. This worked well for the majority of the series, which could spell doom for CLG in future games if other teams also place priority on the bot lane.

CLG ultimately were able to prove that their team fighting is still as strong as ever, pulling out the series win with superior objective control and falling back to their mastered art of split pushing. In Game 5, CLG used their 2-man tp advantage to force NV into risky decision patterns before their top laner gets steamrolled from the man advantage. If CLG are able to use this style against Immortals in their imminent match, they could prove to be a formidable opponent. What remains unknown is which CLG we will see, the CLG which struggles to even get out of laning phase, or the CLG which strategically spreads the map out into an almost unbeatable decision tree?