Unicorns of Love and fastPay Wildcats qualify to the MSI 2021

The second League of Legends regional finals weekend has gotten off to a great start, with Turkey’s TCL and CIS’ LCL finals. Both had matches between previous champions going up against squads that sought to be crowned for the first time.

Next up, we will cover the summary of both best-of-five series that defined the new champions, as well as their regional representatives for the 2021 Mid-Season Invitational.

TCL Finals: 1907 Fenerbahçe vs fastPay Wildcats

The TCL Playoffs had the best six teams in Turkey competing for a ticket to MSI, with Fenerbahçe taking a big step into the finals thanks to their 3-2 victory against NASR Turkey, and a reverse sweep against SuperMassive, which placed them as favourites to win.

On the other hand, fastPay Wildcats had a fairly disputed access, ending with a 3-2 victory in a reverse sweep against Galatasaray Esports, thus reaching their first regional finals.

The first game started with total dominance by the Wildcats, showing a lot of initiative against Fenerbahçe. The latter would not take long to respond since, by the 20th minute, a teamfight in the mid lane managed to even things out, starting a gold disadvantage that the Wildcats could not counteract throughout the game, with Fenerbahçe taking the first point.

The second game was a mirror of the previous one, a good start from Fenerbahçe but with the Wildcats waking up from their lethargy, beginning to collect kills across the map, having a 10k gold difference before minute 20 and managing to open the enemy base, taking the victory a couple of minutes later.

With both teams motivated, Game 3 featured many team battles throughout as the Wildcats concentrated on taking as many targets as possible. By the 24th minute and with the Dragon Soul secured, Fenerbahçe's resistance began to fall.

At minute 30, an attempt to close the game gave Fenerbahçe a few minutes of life who defended their base and went for the Elder Dragon. However, this offence ended up falling in the 37th minute when a teamfight in the mid lane sentenced Fenerbahçe, putting the Wildcats on match point.

Switching sides for the first time in the series, Fenerbahçe did not stop fighting from the beginning of the fourth match. But, like the previous one, the Wildcats' control of objectives ended up levelling the momentum of Fenerbahçe's, who with a state of mind on the ground and with pressure from all sides, fell again and ended up crowning the Wildcats as champions of the TCL and representatives of Turkey in the MSI 2021.

LCL Finals: Unicorns of Love vs CrowCrowd

The LCL finals had both underdog teams reaching the ultimate stage, with Unicorns beating Gambit Esports 3-1, while CrowCrowd slaughtered the first place of the regular season, One Breath Gaming, by a 3-0 score.

With the stakes running high, the first game had a good showing of both teams' preparation, being very levelled in the early game, and with CrowCrowd taking all the drakes. The most important play would come at minute 37 when wanting to close the game, CrowCrowd fell completely in the Unicorns’ base who pressed with everything and after another teamfight, they took their first victory.

Although the second game started very calm, the balance was thrown in the 12th minute when in an ambush attempt in the bot lane, four of the CrowCrowd members were killed by the entire Unicorns offence. With this initial advantage, the Unicorns had no problem taking all the objectives and finally the game, with a difference of more than 18 K gold at minute 32.

The third confrontation was a 360-degree turn for CrowCrowd, as, despite a bad start with a teamfight against them in the 16th minute, their mid-game had big superiority when again at the 22nd minute, another fight for the drake changed the balance of the game in favour of them, who after taking Baron Nashor and an ace, got their first point at minute 26.

For the last game and taking advantage of good momentum, CrowCrowd had a masterful start reaching 9 kills against 4 at minute 15. But, as in previous games, the fights for the dragons were the watershed for Unicorns to recover and their well-known super offensive pressure began.

By the 25th minute, CrowCrowd's advantage was gone, while the key fight would come a few minutes later when defending Baron's attempt, CrowCrowd fell completely into the hands of Unicorns, which took four of them, the Baron Nashor, and subsequently the game.

With this, Unicorns of Love managed to conquer their fourth consecutive regional title, qualifying them as the representatives of the LCL at MSI 2021.

The last qualified to the 2021 Mid-Season Invitational will be decided tomorrow, with the LPL finals between FunPlus Phoenix and RNG, PSG Talon vs Beyond Gaming in the PCS finals, Saigon Buffalo and GAM Esports meeting for the VCS title, and Pain Gaming vs. Vorax for the  CBLOL.