Now that the Spring Playoffs of the various European Regional Leagues (ERL) have finally ended, it’s time for the 2022 EU Masters Spring! All the best teams from each league will reunite and compete in what is the second-highest level of League of Legends competitive play, only behind the LEC!
As always, we’re here to help you out with some breakdowns of the teams and give you our own predictions for the first day of play-ins! Without further ado, let’s jump right into it!
EU Masters Spring 2022 Play-ins
The EU Masters Play-ins is the preliminary part of the tournament, where 16 teams fight for the last 4 spots in the Main Event. Teams are drawn into 4 groups based on their seeding. Each group will have one team of pools 1 and 2 and two teams of pool 3, and teams must all be from different regions within the same group.
The format is a Double Round Robin, with best of one matches. After the end of the groups stage, the top two teams from each group will advance to the Knockout Stage, where 1st place teams will face a 2nd place team in a Bo3 series. The winner of each of the four series will join the rest straight to the main event. Below you can find all the teams featured in the Play-ins Stage:
- LFL – Karmine Corp, Vitality.Bee
- Ultraliga – Iron Wolves, Zero Tenacity
- Prime League – Unicorns of Love Sexy Edition
- SuperLiga – Barça eSports
- EBL – Valiance
- PG Nationals – Macko Esports
- GLL – WLGaming Esports
- LPLOL – For The Win Esports, EGN Esports
- Hitpoint Masters – Entropiq, eSuba
- Elite Series – mCon LG UltraGear, KRC Genk Esports
- NLC – Bifrost
EU Masters Spring Play-in Predictions
Karmine Corp vs Zero Tenacity
Karmine Corp is one of the big favorites to join the Main Event. Coming from the LFL, one of the most competitive regions in Europe, they also have extremely talented players like 113, Cabochard and the legendary Rekkles. The bot lane will be the main focus in this series, as both teams rely on their ADCs for the damage output. If Zero Tenacity finds a lead over there, then they might have a chance.
With that being said, I think that KCorp are without a doubt a tier above the rest in play-ins, with the exception of one or two teams (Vitality.Bee and Barça eSports). This should be an easy bet where you can capitalize.
Prediction: Karmine Corp Win (1.28x)
Entropiq vs Macko Esports
This game will be very interesting. Macko Esports have dominated the Italian ERL, the PG Nats, but unfortunately fell in the finals against Atleta Esports. Despite that, they’ve shown promising stuff over the split, and it will be intriguing to see if there’s still a big gap to the rest of the competition. This match will be the perfect test for them.
On the other hand, Entropiq have dominated the Hitpoint Masters, only losing two games throughout the split. Their proactive jungler Rames as well as their mid laner Eren are cores to this roster: pay attention to them as they might surprise you in this EU Masters.
Prediction: Entropiq Win (1.36x)
Valiance vs eSuba
Valiance and eSuba both come from Pool 3 and their first encounter will be indicative of the strength of the two ERLs (EBL and Hitpoint). Both of these two teams play in a similar way, with split pushing top laners and one main carry between AD and mid. A lot will come down to the junglers and the draft. By looking at past matches, both teams have a higher win rate on red, so eSuba should have a slight advantage.
Prediction: eSuba Win (1.77x)
Bifrost vs UOL Sexy Edition
The last match we will be taking a look at is the one between the NLC Representative Bifrost and the Prime League team UOL Sexy Edition. Bifrost have impressed following the union of the NLC, finishing 2nd behind X7 Esports. They primarily play through their bot lane, with their mid acting as a secondary carry. UOL, on the other hand, heavily relies on their mid laner Korean import Rubi, as he was responsible for almost 1/3 of the team’s total damage output (32.5%).
Between the two, however, I think that having multiple carries grants a much greater advantage in the current meta. While Rubi can for sure carry games, I doubt he will be able to do the same at the EU Masters. With that being said, I’m expecting Bifrost to strike first in this Play-in.
Prediction: Bifrost Win (1.72x)
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