LoL pro Choi “Sword” Sung-won is solely blamed for his team Griffin’s elimination at the League of Legends Worlds 2019. That’s what fans and his former coach say. He also admits to weaknesses. Furthermore, he complained about the lineup and his coach was fired.
Who is that? The 22-year-old Sword is the top laner for the Korean team Griffin. They faced Invictus Gaming in the quarter-finals of the LoL Worlds 2019 on Saturday, which they lost 1:3.
This was the problem: The “top lane” in League of Legends is one of the most challenging positions in the game. A top laner is often left alone in many situations.
He is an “easy target” for the opponent’s ganks.
Often, a tank or at least a robust champ plays here, who cannot expect any support but has to manage on his own. Because he is on the “weak side” of most actions – usually, there are 2 players on the bot lane.
Sword faced the absolute top player of the Chinese team, “TheShy”, who is considered an exceptional player on the top lane.
The weakest player in LoL is getting weaker
Once a player in a LoL match dies for the first time, he misses experience points and gold, while his opponent, who killed him, receives gold and experience points and gets stronger.
Sword proved to be a weakness for his team in the match against Invictus Gaming – he died 22 times over 4 games. He managed only 4 kills himself. He was clearly the weakest link in the chain.
It was probably a pitch-black day. We will see if Sword can recover from this.
We took the title image from the Inven site. It shows Sword at a press conference.
The highlight video of game 4 shows how Sword is taken down time and again until he becomes so weak that he drops from full health to 0 in seconds, without achieving anything.
Sword “complained” his way into the lineup – Coach gets fired
This makes the situation so delicate: Normally, in LoL, you say: “We win as a team, we lose as a team.” This was recently said by Pro player Doublelift after Team Liquid was eliminated in the group stage. In this case, it is different.
The problem is that Griffin otherwise had strong players in all positions – they even have a player named Doran (19) on the team who can play on the top lane and has played there.
However, Sword is said to have contributed to the firing of the long-time coach of the team, cvMax, before the LoL Worlds.
The fired coach has now commented on the performance of his team in a statement (via reddit). He made it clear that he had decided to play Doran in the top lane. He had told everyone that. Under him as coach, Doran would have been the top laner.
Then, Sword would have complained to the team’s general manager behind the coach’s back.
cvMax further states: The other 4 players would be a “world-class” lineup, but when one player is weak, it creates a big gap. The team shouldn’t have lost – Sword should feel very guilty.
This is what Sword himself says: In the press conference, Sword named the “lack of power on the top lane” as the reason for the team’s elimination. (via inven)
No mercy for Sword on reddit
This is what fans say: Sword’s performance was heavily criticized on reddit.
On reddit, they believe:
- The Shy would have ended Sword’s career here.
- Griffin should have dragged “the corpse” of the top laner through the match.
- People wonder why Sword now played carries and forced the mid-laner Chovy onto tanks.
- Sword’s performance was the weakest of any Korean top laner at the World Championship.
- Just the fact that he complained to get into the team after being replaced by Doran is what Western fans criticize him for.
It was probably a pitch-black day. We will see if Sword can recover from this.
We took the title image from the Inven site. It shows Sword at a press conference.
