The LPL resumed on July 19, just one day before the Esports World Cup final in Riyadh, which saw Gen.G defeat Anyone’s Legend. As a reminder, Split 3 will follow a format similar to that of Split 2: two groups separating stronger and weaker teams, followed by the Knight’s Rival Phase and then playoffs to crown the Chinese champion and determine who qualifies for the regional finals — the final step to decide the LPL’s representatives for Worlds, held on home soil from October 14 to November 9.

During the opening week, which featured only five best-of-threes over the weekend of July 19–20, Top Esports and EDward Gaming emerged as the clear winners. Both teams, leading their respective groups, played two series and won both. TES first took down Invictus Gaming and their new jungler Yan "Wei" Yang-Wei in a 2-1 battle, before defeating Weibo Gaming, who had brought back support Liu "Crisp" Qing-Song. On the other side, in the Nirvana group, EDG started strong with a clean 2-0 over Ultra Prime, then cruised to another 2-0 victory against ThunderTalk Gaming.

The debut of the remaining teams

Only half of the teams participating in the LPL Summer Split took part in the first week of competition (7 out of 14). The second week saw the return of AL and Bilibili Gaming from their long journey to Canada and Saudi Arabia, where they played at MSI and the EWC. Let’s start with the Nirvana group, where two teams stood out in particular: EDG and Ninjas in Pyjamas.

With four series played and three victories, Kim "Doinb" Tae-sang and his teammates are determined to secure a spot in the Play-In stage. Their only loss came against EDG, who closed the first two weeks with a perfect 3-0 record. Conversely, LNG Esports and Ultra Prime are still winless, having lost all three of their series so far.

In the Ascend group, TES and Weibo are currently leading with three wins each, though Weibo has one loss, having played one more series. BLG played two best-of-threes and won both—Zhao "Shad0w" Zhi-Qiang, newly arrived from FunPlus Phoenix, replaced Yang "Beichuan" Ling in the jungle, and things seem to be working out well for them.

False start for AL

Surprisingly, reigning Split 2 champions AL, who also proudly represented China at both recent international events, lost both of their matches to BLG and Weibo. Fatigue may be a factor, given the intense travel and scheduling they've faced in the past month. Invictus Gaming bounced back with two wins in week two after an opening loss, while the biggest losers so far are Team WE and FPX—both sit at 0-3 in the brutal Ascend group. The poor results are somewhat expected for FPX, who changed two players in the offseason, including Shad0w, a key piece of their successful Split 2 run.

The LPL will have no breaks from July 19 until August 27, resuming directly on Monday, July 28 for week three. Exciting best-of-threes to watch include IG vs. BLG on Tuesday around 1 PM CET, JDG vs. AL on Saturday, and BLG vs. TES on Sunday. The stakes are high for teams in the Ascend group, as finishing in the top 4 of the group guarantees direct qualification to the Playoffs. Matches can be followed on the LPL English cast every day starting at 11 AM CET.