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LoL World Championships Play-In Odds & Predictions for Group A/B; Will LGD Gaming Lose a Map?

Matthew Hempstead

by Matthew Hempstead in eSports

Updated Mar 8, 2021 · 11:40 AM PST

League of Legends
Spectators watch the final of League of Legends tournament between Team G2 Esports and Team FunPlus Phoenix, in Paris, Sunday, Nov. 10, 2019. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)
  • The League of Legends 2020 World Championship begins on September 25th with the Play-Ins
  • LGD and MAD Lions are favorites to emerge out of their respective groups
  • Four teams will qualify for the Main Event that starts on October 5th

The League of Legends World Championship is happening and it all gets underway with the play-in stage beginning on September 25th. Ten teams will compete in the Play-In stage for the final four spots in the main event. The ten teams have been split into two groups, and the team with the best record after round-robin play will automatically qualify. The rest will compete in a knockout bracket.

Play-In Group A Odds

Team Odds
MAD Lions -175
Team Liquid +150
Papara SuperMassive +1400
INTZ +2500
Legacy +3300

All odds taken Sep 22 at Bet365

EU vs NA

Group A is definitely the more interesting of the two. You’ve got the third seed out of North America, the fourth seed out of Europe and the best teams from Brazil, Turkey and Oceania. As the odds clearly illustrate, EU and NA should be the clear favorites. Over the past couple of years, Europe’s improvement at Worlds as been well documented and the region has become a yearly threat alongside the likes of China and Korea. Even the fourth-best team in the region has a lot of skill and MAD Lions should be able to handily win Group A.

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Their toughest opponents will be Team Liquid but North America never makes it look easy on the international stage. In 2018, Cloud9 barely made it to the main event after being pushed to a game 5 in their qualification match. In general, NA doesn’t often perform well at Worlds but they still get into the main event.

SuperMassive out of Turkey has a chance to throw a wrench into the plans of MAD Lions and Team Liquid but there really isn’t another appealing team here. There could be an upset or two within the group but nothing that will lead to SuperMassive or INTZ winning the group over MAD or TL.

Pick: MAD Lions (-175)

Play-In Group B Odds

Team Odds
LGD Gaming -10000
Unicorns of Love +1400
PSG Talon +3500
Rainbow7 +4000
V3 Esports +6500

LGD’s Cakewalk

Have you ever seen a team so heavily favored? LGD enter as -10000 to get out of this group and it’s very understandable why. Over the past couple of years, China has challenged Korea for the title of ‘Best Region’ and they’re now back-to-back champions. LGD who is the 4th seed out of China should have absolutely no problems taking down these wild card teams. No other team in the group comes from a major region and honestly, even teams from North America and Europe will struggle against LGD. Even the fourth seed from China is a force to be reckoned with and it’d be shocking if they didn’t win this group.

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The Unicorns of Love are really the only other team worth mentioning here. They made Worlds last year but narrowly missed out on making it to the main event. They’re the toughest test to LGD in the group as they absolutely dominated their region this year. Of course, there’s no team in the CIS at the same caliber as LGD. As good as UoL is, they haven’t truly been challenged since Worlds 2019.

Pick: LGD (-10000)

Will LGD Gaming Drop a Map Odds

Will LGD Drop a Map? Odds
Yes +110
No -150

LGD is so heavily favored that they have an outrageous prop bet. Will LGD Gaming drop a map? In the group stage, LGD will only have to play four games and to be honest, they probably won’t be challenged a single time. LGD should be expected to go 4-0 in their group and it would take a massive mistake for them to drop a game to anyone in this group. This seems like an easy ‘No’ to me.

Pick: No (-150)

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