League of Legends Worlds 2024: Weibo Gaming, The Poisoned Chalice (9/20)

The League of Legends 2024 World Championship kicks off in Berlin on the 25th of September. A total of 20 teams will compete to succeed T1 at the top of the Riot Games MOBA world hierarchy. On this occasion, Sheep Esports brings you a daily feature on one of the teams taking part. This September 13th, the ninth episode of our series focuses on Weibo Gaming, LPL fourth seed.

The history of Weibo Gaming coming so close to being crowned Worlds champions began before the organisation was even named Weibo. Indeed, previously known as Suning, the team did a miraculous run at Worlds in 2020, its first feat of arms since the org integrated the LoL esports ecosystem. As Suning came third in the LPL Summer split, the team qualified to Worlds by winning the Regional Finals. That year, they had to face the two teams that outperformed them domestically in quarter and semi finals, respectively JD Gaming (China's second seed) and Top Esports (China's first seed).

Indeed Suning grew very well between the Summer Split and the Playoffs stage at Worlds 2020. They confirmed it by winning in style against both teams (3-1). But in the end, Damwon Kia, driven by Kim "Canyon" Geon-bu and Heo "ShowMaker" Su was way stronger. Since 2021 and 2022 are to be forgotten - the team has achieved nothing by trying to stick to the 2020 core - the only highlight for this era is that the org renamed after being acquired by the Chinese social media platform: Weibo.

In 2023, the team finally got rid of its most likely rusty core from 2020 and rebuilt a new project around the World champion and legend Kang "TheShy" Seung-lok. With the experienced Li "Xiaohu" Yuanhao on the midlane and the botlane composed of Wang "Light" Guangyu along with another World champion, Liu "Crisp" Qingsong, the team seemed much more ambitious. Even though they didn't deliver during both LPL splits, as Suning in 2020, they defied all odds by qualifying via the Regional Finals to Worlds and going all the way to the Grand Final of the competition. But yet again, they fell short against another Korean behemoth: T1 (0-3).

This year, the team kept their midlaner and botlaners from 2023 but made some changes on the topside. As the changes were not that convincing at the end of the spring split, where Weibo came 5th-6th, Lee "Tarzan" Seung-yong and Chen "Breathe" Chen were recruited for summer. The jungler, especially seems to be struck by the same curse as his new team since he is still seeking for glory, after three second-place finishes in LCK, with Griffin between 2018 and 2019, and his second place from last year's summer, in the LPL, with LNG.

Still, Weibo never made it to a grand final domestically and this new team has been designed to try and remedy it, even though only a few people believed they had a chance. Again, against all odds, the team made their way through the lower bracket, after eliminating none other than Song "Rookie" Eui-jin's star player from NiP and then climbed their way through grand final. Weibo suffered to achieve it, as they eliminated LNG and Top Esports both on silver scrapes (3-2). But guess what? The team crumbled in final, losing 0-3 against Bilibili Gaming... again.

If the team qualified on the edge, by defeating Park "Ruler" Jae-hyuk and JDG (3-2) during the regional qualifier, they will, just like last year, represent China as the fourth seed. But as every other times, Weibo should not be taking for granted since it seems that this underdog outfit suits them perfectly, as this team always find a way to surprise everybody...

The team relied especially on Tarzan's versatility, who was able to carry games on his own with AP Carries, especially Brand, Lillia or Nidalee but also to showcase other kind of gamestyles, with champions like Maokai and Sejuani. The lord of the jungle really lived up to his name this summer. But also Light, that stepped up heavily this split and was not afraid to take on his responsibilities even against one of the best to ever do it on his position (Ruler), on a qualification series, as he took every MVPs of his team's won games, during this last BO5.