The second series of today’s Play-in Knockout Stage is a showdown between the EU LCS third seed, Fnatic and LMS third seed, Hong Kong Attitude.
Fnatic will enter the series still wavering between the highs of their early Summer Split and the lows of the last several months. During the group stage, their quality seemed to shift from game to game, with the final match against Young Generation, their only loss of the tournament so far, proving to be the lowest point. That being said, the team as a whole remains one of the most talented in the Play-in stage, and has certainly proven in the past that they have what it takes to be a high level team.
As for Hong Kong Attitude, this series is a perfect chance to prove that they can compete with some of the world’s biggest teams. During the group stage they lost only to Turkey’s 1907 Fenerbahçe and managed to take the team to a tiebreaker match to determine the group’s seeding. During these games it was often the laning phase of HKA that looked the most impressive, which could make them a dangerous match up for their European opponents.
The series will be a best of five and will take place shortly after the conclusion of Cloud9 vs Lyon Gaming.