On the 19th, SK Telecom T1 made it to the Knockout Stage of the 2019 LoL World Championship with a 5-1 record in Group C, known as the ‘group of death’. After they’ve secured a spot in the quarters, Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok shared some of his thoughts going into the next stage.

*This interview was conducted on Day 7 of the Group Stage.

Congratulations, you’ve made it through the group stage in 1st place. How do you feel?

I’m satisfied that we’ve made it through as the first seed, but we've revealed weaknesses in our performances. I’ll do my best to improve that coming back to the Knockout Stage.

All the players have new shoes coming to the tournament. Do you like it?

I don’t really care what shoes I wear since shoes don’t affect playing games, but I do feel good that they got me these new shoes.

When fans watch your pro view, they feel dizzy. Why do you look around so much?

It’s kind of a habit, and I look at the situations in other places very often, so I guess fans feel that because of that.

How was the group stage overall?

After finishing the group stage, I felt that our own performance is important. The reason we lost today was that we made several mistakes in a row. If we can improve our performance, we would be able to take home good results.

What do you think went wrong against Fnatic?

I think we lost because the whole team made too many mistakes.

Do you think you’ll be doing a different pose when you take pictures beside 'thumbs up'?

I’ll think about it later.

You were recently reading ‘The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck’. Have you finished reading it?

Yes, I’ve finished reading it. When we have so many games to play, I can’t read that often, so I just try to keep reading little by little.

Does it help ease your mind when reading?

Whatever the book is, I think it’s helpful to me. Since reading books is my hobby, I try to read as much as I can, whatever the genre is.

In 2015, you ‘rolled’ onto the stage. If you make it to the finals this year, do you think you’ll do something similar to that?

I’ll have to think about that.

How do you think Group D would go?

Since I think the LCK teams are good, I think DAMWON would make it through, but I think it depends on how they all do.

What do you think about the other mid laners in Group C?

All three players aren’t players that have strong laning phases, but I think they all are good players that work well around the team.

What’s your goal at this Worlds?

Our goal is to win the championship.

Lastly, a word to the fans?

We made it through groups as the first seed; we’ll do our best from the quarters to the finals.

*Special thanks to EsportsFocus for the support.