French League of Legends organisation GameWard caused an upset in France’s LFL Summer 2022 playoffs a few days ago.
They beat back-to-back-to-back Amazon European (EU) Masters champions Karmine Corp (KC) 3-1 in round one of the playoffs, preventing them from reaching the Summer 2022 EU Masters.
For some in the Northern League of Legends Championship (NLC), the European Regional League for the UK, Ireland and Nordics, it was sweet revenge – and could spark hope for an NLC team to finally win the EU Masters this summer, especially after the NLC gained a third EUM seed recently.
This comes after KC beat two NLC teams in the 2021 EU Masters grand finals – BT Excel in the Spring 2021 EUM final and Fnatic Rising (who are now in the Spanish league) in the Summer 2021 EUM final. And KC beat LDLC in the Spring 2022 EUM final, after NLC sides X7 and Bifrost reached the top eight in the EUM Spring 2022 tournament.
But not only were KC prevented from qualifying for the upcoming EU Masters, it was former Excel players who helped do it: ADC Innaxe and mid-laner Czekolad, who now play for GameWard.
Excel, of course, are an LEC team that have their JD XL academy team in the NLC, who recently reached the NLC Summer 2022 playoffs. They’re currently on a four-game loss-streak in the LEC following a strong start in the competition.
Innaxe played for Excel in 2017, and then also another stint in 2018 to 2019.
And he helped GameWard beat KC in emphatic fashion, securing a pentakill along the way:
Innaxe said after the game, ‘what a way’ for him to finally make it to EU Masters, and that he knows he can be one of the best ADCs out there:
Other players on GameWard include Melonik, Akabane and Kamilius, who played the series following an extremely traumatic and sad situation, after his mother took her own life.
KC of course have former Fnatic and G2 bot laner Rekkles, who will be disappointed not to reach EUM.
We’ve collated some other tweets from people in the UK/Ireland/Nordics scene reacting to the news.
Related article: When X7 Esports stunned reigning EU Masters champions Karmine Corp in a 28-minute stomp
Dom is an award-winning writer and finalist of the Esports Journalist of the Year 2023 award. He graduated from Bournemouth University with a 2:1 degree in Multi-Media Journalism in 2007.
As a long-time gamer having first picked up the NES controller in the late ’80s, he has written for a range of publications including GamesTM, Nintendo Official Magazine, industry publication MCV and others. He worked as head of content for the British Esports Federation up until February 2021, when he stepped back to work full-time on Esports News UK and offer esports consultancy and freelance services. Note: Dom still produces the British Esports newsletter on a freelance basis, so our coverage of British Esports is always kept simple – usually just covering the occasional press release – because of this conflict of interest.
