Season 5: Fines, the Donezo Manifesto, and Pobelter
But this is CLG we’re talking about. They never catch breaks. The next series of unfortunate events to befall the team came in the form of new coach Scarra, and new players Jake “Xmithie” Puchero and Darshan “ZionSpartan” Upadhyaya. Scarra and Darshan would both be found guilty of violating Riot’s anti-tampering/poaching provision. What this means is that both Scarra and Darshan were both approached by CLG with recruitment offers, or “poached”, while still under contract from their previous employer (Dignitas). CLG was fined $10,000, Darshan and Xmithie $2,000, and Doublelift $2,500 for being involved. This was the most serious punishment ever issued by Riot, and it gave the company some street cred by reminding other teams that they don’t mess around with enforcing their policies.
To make matters worse, Darshan would miss the opening game of the Season, and due to the litigation penalty, CLG was without a head coach for the first three weeks of the Spring Split. Yet despite this, they were able to claw their way to third place by the end of the Split. Unfortunately, their Playoff performance history came back to haunt them, and after getting 3-0’d by Team Liquid they ended the season in fifth. But that wasn’t the worst of it.
Midlaner Link left at the end of the Spring Split, and posted a savage statement, aka the “Donezo Manifesto” in which he explained in detail his role in CLG and what the team was like from an inside perspective. It blew up Reddit. Fans didn’t know what to do. Anyone who ever played with CLG released their own statements in regard to the Manifesto, and everything became so muddy and convoluted with contradictory claims- it was a PR nightmare. It was a dark time for CLG (you can read what Link had to say here).
To replace Link in the Summer Split, CLG brought on both Huhi and Pobelter, with the intention that the two would rotate in the midlane, much like how SKT does with Faker and Easyhoon. The only difference in what CLG did, is that they gave Huhi the shaft and didn’t allow him to play a single game when they saw Pobelter perform well and carry them to second place before Playoffs. Pobelter enabled CLG to meet TSM in the finals: and the fans loved him for it. It was a battle for the ages. CLG back on their feet with a hot new midlaner, ready to smack down their ancient rivals. And smackdown they did. Between Pobelter’s Viktor and Doublelifts pentakill on Caitlyn, CLG would walk away with the North America Championship crown for the first time. Things were looking up going into Worlds: yet not entirely unexpected, North America was yet again represented poorly with CLG leaving Europe early at the bottom of their bracket.
tl;dr (a lot happened in Season 5)
- Scarra, Darshan, Xmithie, Doublelift fines
- Ended 5th in Spring Split
- Link leaves, destroys the internet and challenges fans with his “Donezo Manifesto”
- Pobelter replaced him, carried CLG to Finals
- Beat arch nemesis TSM in Finals
- Got stomped at Worlds
Season 6: Trading Pros for Rookies
If you’ve followed my other posts’ you’ve seen this picture before. Excuse the reptition, but: It’s just that big of a deal. Doublelift getting let go from CLG because of continual behavioral issues was one thing: getting picked up by TSM was another. The internet lost its mind. Not only that, CLG let go of it’s Summer Split star, Pobelter, who would go on to play for super stacked team Immortals (I’m writing about them next). Between Doublelift and Pobelter being let go for two rookies, Huhi and new ADC Trevor “Stixxay” Hayes, fans and analysts alike suspected the roster change would put CLG back in the center of the pack.
They were wrong.
In the Spring Finals, CLG had a fantastic season and went up against TSM for the crown. Doublelift faced off against his old team of four years, and lost. The new roster change in CLG sparked concern that they would once again be unable to gel and develop that all important synergy, yet the 2016 Season 6 CLG has more synergy than ever before. In a sick twist of fate, it was TSM who was struggling with synergy, going through a roster shuffle of their own, (read about it here), that cost them the W going against CLG in the Finals. Trading the pros for the rookies paid off for CLG, and they beat TSM in the finals for the second Split in a row. And it felt amazing.
tl;dr
- Doublelift gets kicked, picked up by TSM
- Pobelter gets switched out for rookie Huhi
- CLG drafts rookie ADC Stixxay
- CLG has fantastic season, finds themselves vs TSM in the Finals
- Beats them for the second Split in a row for the NA Crown
So what now?
That’s where you come in! The rest of the story is being written now! Having killed it in the Spring Split, CLG was invited to MSI (read: Mini Worlds), and crushed it! They had so much hype coming into the Summer Split, but they’ve been unable to carry that momentum over to their games. They’re currently sitting in seventh place, and rival TSM is sitting comfortably in first. Huhi has been having performance problems, and despite reassurance from Aphromoo that the team “just needs more time” to gel, fans and analyst’s suspect that Aphromoo and Xmithie are carrying the rest of the team.
I hope these articles gave you a better glimpse into the heart of CLG and inspired you to tune into LCS this weekend. If CLG isn’t your team, and you’re silently fuming that I didn’t cover your favorite team first, don’t sweat it! I’m gonna fill you in on all the major teams before Worlds gets here, so you can enjoy the games they way they’re meant to be! Happy watching!
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