The 2020 Mid-Season Cup finally closes its curtains as the victor in the all-LPL showdown has been finally determined. This will be a first in the history of Top Esports’ legacy, bearing the winning title to the first-ever tournament of its kind after beating FunPlus Phoenix in a convincing fashion.

Both teams played to their best, but the same goes for all the Chinese and Korean teams that participated in this off-season global tournament. The LCK teams put up a good fight in this inter-regional showdown, but it looks like the LPL wants to show the world who’s the boss of League eSports.

FINALS: FunPlus Phoenix versus Top Esports

The blind pick game brought out the best picks from each team. Some of these iconic picks are the likes of Karsa’s Lee Sin, Doinb’s Galio, and JackeyLove’s Varus. Crisp and yuyanjia engaged in a Thresh mirror for their beloved marksmen.

Top Esports won the first game with Karsa as the Player of the Game for his insane jungle presence and team play.

On the second game, however, FPX did what they do best: pulling up the uncommon picks. This time in their magic trick was the rarely-seen Kayle Top pick by Khan. Top Esports were caught off-guard by this maneuver, and Khan won the Player of the Game with a surprising 10-2 kill/death score.

Now understanding that Doinb is one of the team’s crucial keys to victory, they solely target banned his key picks in Game 3 while starting to play their favorite game: Protect the JackeyLove!

This turned out to be a great decision for Top Esports, especially with their composition with JackeyLove’s Ezreal with around three supports in Karsa’s Lee Sin, Knight’s Orianna, and yuyanjia’s Yuumi. There was some skepticism in the picks, but JackeyLove’s staggering 32.3k damage dealt to enemy champions brought them to victory.

In TES’ tournament point game, 369 pulled an entire 360 on the audience and locked Lucian in the top lane, a pick that in the previous days was essentially a team curse for whoever picked it.

However, in a post-game interview, 369 said that he was comfortable in the Lucian pick and was willing to take that loss if it meant to eat up the pressure and help the rest of his team scale and win. Surprisingly, it was a great move for him to do so because JackeyLove once more played immensely with his team towards the victory, and claimed their first tournament win as a team.

Why did China perform better than Korea?

Looking at the big picture in the Mid-Season Cup, it honestly did not feel a cup when the finals were just between two teams of the same region.

However, that was the result of the excellent performance of the teams who got there, whether you like it or not.

Taking a nugget from our previous piece regarding the Chinese dynasty of World Championships, it all boils down to the fact that the LPL teams objectively performed better, given their statistics and performances that were clearly broadcasted worldwide.

Driving the LPL teams’ excellent results was the massive difference between the Korean playstyle and the Chinese playstyle – something that even the commentators of the cup have mentioned repeatedly.

Observe the ways that Gen.G, DragonX, DAMWON Gaming, and T1 have lost too. One common denominator between the losses of this team was the unrelenting aggression of their LPL counterparts. Even the slow but steady FunPlus Phoenix knew to take the initiative when they knew that their enemy would play slowly, such as in the case of T1.

In addition to that, the slow and methodical playstyle of Korean teams is losing its luster. The LPL teams understood this and moved to capitalize, because if the LCK teams will play slow, it means nothing game-changing will come from them until the time is right and the setup is complete.

Without a safety net for the slow team to help their setup towards the late game, expect a few turrets taken down and the fast team to be on dragon soul point at 20 minutes.

Concluding Thoughts

Given the performance of the Top 4 Korean teams, and how only one of them managed to go to the semifinals, it may be a sign for them to start studying these hyper-aggressive and teamfight-loving compositions from the LPL and devise a way to diminish their power somewhat.

This control-style of play from the Koreans will not get them far in the global scene If they lack ways to somehow mitigate the overwhelming pressure that these aggressive LPL teams can dish out.

While the LPL has teams that are proficient in either aggressive or slow-paced gameplay, there’s always a glaring weakness in either style. It’s up for the LCK teams—as well as the other region’s teams—to understand the Chinese playstyle, just like how they eventually learned how to beat the Koreans in the global scene starting 2018 onwards.

Will we finally see some development and adaptation from the LCK after this exhibition tournament? Will Top Esports start preparing for some renewed challengers once the Summer Season starts in a few weeks?

For now, I’d just like to give Top Esports the credit that they’re due. They didn’t win by accident, and they have all the potential to make a big splash for the rest of the year. One thing’s for certain, though. No one will be sleeping on them in the second half of 2020.

Find out on the developing story that is Season 10 once the midseason starts to pass!