G2 Esports are the inaugural LEC Champions. A first place finish in the 2019 LEC Spring Split followed by an undefeated run in the 2019 LEC Spring Playoffs have put G2 back atop the throne of Europe. The villains-maybe-now-heroes of EU will represent its region at the 2019 Mid-Season Invitational.

G2's 3-0 of Origen in the Final was textbook G2, in that it was not textbook. G2 pulled out Sona/Taric in game 1, only to turn the clock back to 2018 and run a funnel composition to counter Origen's Sona/Taric draft in game 2. The 3rd game was a tad more conventional - Bot Laner Luka "Perkz" Perković played Neeko, but the composition around the Curious Chameleon was garden variety compared to the exquisiteness of G2's first two drafts.

Following G2's championship victory, Head Coach Fabian "GrabbZ" Lohmann joined Inven Global reporter Tom Matthiesen to discuss the team's approach to the LEC Finals, game 2's funnel comp, and take a look at what the team must improve on heading into MSI. 

First of all, congratulations on what was quite the Final for G2 Esports. What did you think of your team's performance?

I was a bit surprised it was so one-sided. We thought Origen would fare a bit better heading into the series, because they are a good team, don't get me wrong, but I think Origen failed to adapt to our style.

If you lose the first game and the second game is against a funnel composition, it's hard to come back from that 2-0. I've been there with G2 last year against Fnatic. G2 was expecting to win the LEC with a 6-0 in playoffs. We didn't want to go into it too cocky, but we knew about our strengths and we knew that if we play our game and don't run it down, we should win every game in playoffs.


Did the one-sidedness of the victory alter your feelings towards the result?

I mean, there's always doubt, right? Origen is a team that prepares really well against an opponent. Sona-Taric Bot Lane came up against us, so we had to find something fast that works against it, for example. There are always those factors.

For example, looking back at the first game in our first playoff series against Origen, that game could have gone either way. If they win that game and start to believe in themselves, then maybe the outcome is different. We went into the Finals today with a lot of respect for them, and we still have it.


Were you hoping to face Origen in the finals again, or were you expecting Fnatic?

I think both teams are very similar in their approach, so we would not have minded either. We focus on what we want to play first, and then we think about our opponents. Of course, it would have been nice to crush Fnatic just return the favor from last year, but in the end, we didn't mind who we faced.

What was your preparation against Origen in this Final? The funnel composition certainly changed the flow of the series.

Playing funnel was huge if we got to the Final, because there's no way a team can adapt after only one day. Beforehand, you can have a read based on what you see in scrims, but teams can always change something up.

For example, Origen banned Kayle against us every game in our first playoffs match. Origen also banned Kayle against Fnatic, so we knew that there was no way they were going to play the champion. There is a chance that Kayle gets countered pretty hard, but we won too many scrims on it, so that's not something that should get handed to us as the first seed.

Speaking more towards the preparation of the Finals, since we didn't know who we were going to play against, we had to focus more on ourselves. We focused on the compositions we wanted to play, then what they could get countered by, and then we went from there. We had some matching champion pools between Fnatic and Origen - both teams like Karthus, so that was an effective ban against both teams.


Can you break down G2's funnel composition approach heading into the series?

Perkz said, 'Sona/Taric is very obnoxious...what could be more obnoxious?' We had a discussion before that if we played funnel unsuccessfully in the series,  then we could just ban Sona in the fourth game and we should win no matter what. That sounds a bit cocky, but we felt really confident in trying the style out.

Heading into MSI, even though we've only shown this style one time, every opponent has to be prepared for it. They'll have to watch VoDs now and make sure they're ready to play against it, so that's why we wanted to show what we can actually do with the composition.

MSI is coming up next. What do you think G2 can improve on before the start of the tournament?

We play League differently, and it can look unorthodox sometimes, so we need to find a balance between our style and the actual meta. We still make mistakes on transitioning setting up for objective. For example, in the first game today, Origen got the first dragon buff because they prioritized the vision around it. Caps went in too early, sure, but that mistake was a result of us as a team not being there on time.

We can improve on our objective play, and I'm sure we can improve on how we play more conventional lanes. I hope that good teams like SKT, Team Liquid, or Invictus Gaming will punish us so we can actually play those situations out.