Hey guys ( and girls ) as a European myself, I thought i’d throw in my opinion on the upcoming LCS promotion playoffs, i’ll go into a little bit of detail on each matchup and hope to provide you, the fans, with a little more of an insight into the European amateur scene.

Game 1 – Meet Your Makers (MYM) vs Dexter Is Actually Evil. (DEX)

MYM are by far the best team in the European amateur scene. They were favourites to qualify last time round, however they met Fnatic in the quarterfinals and well, being knocked to the losers bracket by the future European champions isn’t that bad. After that they lost to Dragonborns quite surprisingly in the final. Since then, MYM have been pretty unstoppable. As a former manager of an amateur European team ( Myrevenge ) I can tell you from 1st hand experience just how good they are, that along with very creditable performances at various IEM events makes MYM an extremely dangerous team.

I don’t know a great deal about Dex, other than that they qualified as the 4th team, and the lowest seed from the online ladder tournament. The roster is pretty good, and the manager is the former manager of Millenium, who sadly disbanded not too long ago. Here is a quote from the Dex manager, Flyy.

“We are going into to the qualifier as underdogs, not many people are considering us as a contender for an LCS Spot but we are going there with the goal to win and qualify. We are praccticing hard right now and we won’t go out without a fight!”

My money is on MYM for this one. I have seen Dex play some good games and make some decent results, but MYM are on another level, and are, in my opinion, on the level of challenging the top 4 of Europe.

Game 2 – Alternate (ATN) vs Wizards

Most of my readers will probably already recognize the name Alternate. An extremely strong amateur team, home of the Elo king himself, Forellenlord. Not just him though, Jree ( Former sub for CLG EU/EG ), Creaton ( Former ADC for Millenium ), Kerp ( the Elo prince ), and ofcourse, Araneae, former jungler for SK and participant in the season 2 world finals. This is a pretty experienced roster, and if I was Araneae, i’d be desperate to get back into the top tiers after being there once already. ATN qualified as the 2nd seed from the Lille promotion tournament after losing 0-2 to MYM in the final.

Their opponents, Wizards…I would love to add some information here but I have almost nothing. Wizards qualified for the offline event by placing 3rd in the ranked 5’s promotion tournament after a fairly easy bracket and a loss to TCM gaming.

Alternate to take this one, the wealth of experience that ATN have is going to be too much for the Wizards here.

Game 3 – Sinners Never Sleep (SNS) vs TCM Gaming (TCM)

now this should be a close and exciting game. You may remember TCM from the last LCS qualifiers, where they participated as Heyijustmetyou. After a string of decent results in scrims and amateur tournaments, I believe TCM are ready to cause somewhat of an upset if they are to beat SNS AND aAa. It is to be noted that TCM are going to be using ImSoFresh ( Formerly jungler for Millenium ) for the qualification tournament.

SNS are a team that are pretty recently formed, including players from mMe, Tabzz from Millenium, and SK sub and one of my former players, Noonia!. The roster for this team is pretty decent, and coupled with some good amateur tournament results, SNS vs TCM should prove to be a great game.

For this game, I have ties to both teams, Noonia, one of my former players is now on SNS, whilst i’m pretty good friends with the manager of TCM. It’s a hard one to call but i’m going to put my money on TCM.

Game 4 – Esports4Life vs Anexis Esports.

Another game that promises to be a fairly close one. Anexis Esports are another team you may remember from the last LCS qualifiers, or maybe even from their recent 2nd place at IEM Sao Paulo, or 5/6th at IEM worlds. Theres no doubt about it, Anexis are a dangerous team that could pose a threat to Copenhagen Wolves existence as an LCS team, if they are to beat Esport4Life that is…

Esport4Life is pretty much the former MouseSports. The team may ring a bell if I just refer to them as ‘ YoungBucks team ‘. Anyway, recently they have been on a pretty good run, taking 1st place in the Solomid EU Invitational 4, winning against AT Gaming. This team has some pretty decent experience within the roster, and this could be a pretty close game.

After asking captain YoungBuck what he thought of his teams chances in the promotion tournament, he simply replied with ” We will come on top without losing a single map ”

It’s hard to call a winner here, but i’m going to go with Anexis, but to be honest it could easily go either way, this quarter final should be a great game. The experience in the recent IEMs would’ve helped Anexis a lot, and I feel that if they get to face Copenhagen Wolves, their meeting will produce an epic encounter.

On the topic of Copenhagen Wolves, I decided to reach out to Deficio of the Wolves to ask how he thought his team would do, the result? – Skype screenshot

Of the current LCS teams that have been thrown into the promotion mix, I feel that all of them are at a high risk of losing their spots. DragonBorns will likely have to face MYM, which is a rematch of the last LCS qualifiers. However this time around, I feel like MYM will have the edge.

Giants will most probably have to face Alternate, who are also a really good amateur team, although this game may be closer, I still feel that Alternate will have the upper hand.

aAa will face either TCM or SNS, both of which are very good teams. I feel like these will be the closest of the matches, as all 3 teams are on a similar skill level.

Copenhagen Wolves will have to face either Anexis or Esport4Live. I’m calling Anexis vs Wolves but it could be the other. I think it will be a pretty close game, but I think Wolves will be able to take it and retain their place in the LCS

Thanks for reading guys! please feel free to comment you opinions, and throw me a follow on twitter! @howspiffing 🙂