EMEA Masters: A new French civil war and an undecided MCK-GO

This Tuesday, we will advance further into the EMEA Masters Summer 2024 as we will know the last four remaining teams that will play the semifinals during the week. So far, Team BDS Academy and Los Heretics have qualified on the main bracket lower side of the competition between the best national League of Legends' teams in the region.

France-Italy has established itself as a classic among the classics in many traditional sports. However, in League of Legends, Italy's lack of strong teams before recent times has made rare occurrences where the two countries would meet, in fact, they have never met before this day on the playoffs phase of the EMEA Masters, since its debut in 2018.

On paper, French #4 seed is supposed to be slightly below Macko in terms of power ranking. However, with their statement victory over Dark Passage, the Turkish #2 seed who were so far on to a good tournament, Team GO seem to have reached their peak and pose a threat higher than ever. It is mostly GO's botlane Jean "Jezu" Massol and Olivier "Prime" Payet that have performed very well. The former LEC AD Carry is finally starting to show why he was among EMEA's elite at some point.

It would be reductive to sum up GO's recent arise to their botlane performance, as the team has clearly fixed many of its midgame macro mistakes that plundered them in LFL. Mehdi "Boukada" Lahlou, the jungler, had often looked isolated from its teammates throughout the season, an issue that seems to be partly resolved as of now.

Macko Esports on the other hand could not have had a harder tournament run so far, exiting the swiss stage 4-3 and beating DSYRE in a very close 3-2 BO5, The team have proven that the cumulated experience of the roster has given them a cold blood. The italian #1 seed is the team that has played the most matches in the main event, however, Team GO also have the LCQ in their legs.

Jungler Dušan "Lotuss" Nedeljković has been one of the main reason of MCK's prowess this year and in this tournament, handling the early game almost on his own. His matchup against Boukada will be decisive in the early game. It is not the first time that the serbian jungler has upgraded his level for an EMEA Masters event, as he was already outstanding in 2022, back to when he was at OP.

Nonetheless, similarly as GO, MCK's main strength is without a doubt their botlane consisting of Nikolaj Asbjorn "DenVoksne" Meilby, an adc whose experience and consistency in the big stage is not to be proven, and Vittorio "Click" Massolo, italian veteran who is on a second youth this year. The Zeri pick should be heavily contested between the two teams, but both botlanes don't have the same style, while GO has been able to play very aggressively, MCK has always privileged more scaling and 2 item spikes.

The other match will see Vitality.Bee face BK ROG, two ambitious LFL teams that have never managed to perform in the EMEA Masters throughout their history. In fact, Vitality has had the reputation of choking on the regional stage, a reputation they intend on cleansing with a victory this evening.

It is very likely that we have the strongest iteration of VIT.B roster ever, with a Swiss Stage that saw them barely miss the 4-0 run after a cliffhanger BO3 against Geekay. VIT has then managed to demolish Barça esports in almost less than an hour, dismantling the Spanish #2 seed in a way that clearly was not allowed by any church or religious authority. Kacper "Daglas" Dagiel, who had a rough start in the LEC this season, has revealed himself as the main carry of his team alongside Mateusz "Czajek" Czajka, who always shines in Vitality's high stakes matches.

BK ROG, on the other hand, have not shown a true big moment so far, qualifying in the round of 16 with difficulty and beating - with not such a big margin - a very weak Entropiq, it is uncertain whether BK ROG has the level to beat The Bees or not. Surprisingly, the two teams have not faced each other during the LFL playoffs (in Spring and in Summer), so the data they have on one-another is not that wide.

Lee "Hans SamD" Jae-hoon is a force that BKR will be certain to have against Vitality, the Korean veteran has most of its overstepping mistakes behind him and is on paper a stronger reliability than Josip "Jopa" Čančar. The topside matchup is not to be overlooked in this BO5, with two players that tend to overextend in order to get a lead, games could be decided on the Kaan "Naak Nako" Okan - Jeon "Howling" Ho-bin duel, with no player having an edge over his opponent on paper.