Saturday afternoon marked the start of the 2nd week of play at the European Season 3 Championship Series, which is taking place in Cologne, Germany. Coming into the 2nd week, Fnatic, SK Gaming and Evil Geniuses found themselves tied in 1st place, all three with 2 wins and only 1 loss. Now that the first day of week 2 is over, we bring you a review of what happened yesterday in Cologne.

DragonBorns and Evil Geniuses to start the day

First match of the day marked the debut of one of the most surprising teams during the Season 3 EU Qualifiers, Team DragonBorns, who for their first match would be facing fan favorites Evil Geniuses. Without further a-do, let's move to the picks and bans:

Picks:

EG:

DB:

Bans:

EG:

DB:

This game started out with an invade from Evil Geniuses into DragonBorns top side of the jungle, where they would manage to steal the red buff from Malunoo. Unfortunately for DragonBorns, their top laner Spontexx had to burn his flash during the jungle invade in order to survive, which gave Wickd an early advantage on the top lane. With Snoopeh taking the red buff from DragonBorns, Malunoo went in to the jungle of Evil Geniuses, and with the help of his bot lane he managed to steal the red buff, making up for the red buff they had lost earlier.

After the initial aggression in the jungle, both teams decided to play safe and farm as much as possible. Evil Geniuses seemed to have no problems in the top and mid lanes, but their bottom lane was struggling hard against the duo from DragonBurns as Hosan was 20+ cs ahead of Yellowpete 8 minutes into the game.

The farm game would continue until minute 16, when the first glimpse of true action would reach our screens, and surprisingly for many, it would be Yellowpete securing first blood in the bottom lane despite the big despair in cs compared to his counterpart at DragonBorns. More action would unfold immediately after first blood, as Shushei came to help bot lane, securing himself a kill, which would be followed by a kill from Malunoo onto Krepo. The score would be equalized to 2-2 after Wickd managed to kill Spontexx up in the top lane.

As the fight in the bottom lane finished, DragonBorns headed directly to dragon in order to secure the extras gold, but Evil geniuses would reply taking out both the top and mid outer turrets, which ultimately gave them an small gold advantage of around 1k gold.

From there on, it would be more or less smooth sailing for Evil Geniuses, as they would manage to win every single fights in the next 20 minutes. At minute 36 Evil Geniuses managed to catch DragonBorns in their jungle, allowing Yellowpete to secure a triple kill in the fight, and making it a 3 for nothing exchange in their favor. With only 2 members left standing for DragonBorns, Evil Geniuses marched directly towards DragonBorns´s base, where they would meet next to no resistance, managing to take down the nexus thus securing their first win of the day.

Copenhagen Wolves vs SK Gaming

The second game of the day would see Copenhagen Wolves face off against Ocelote and company from SK Gaming. Copenhagen Wolves were looking for their first win of the season, while SK Gaming were in need of the win if they were to keep up with Evil Geniuses in the rankings.

Picks:

CPHW:

SK:

Bans:

CPHW:

SK:

Unlike in the first match of the day, spectators weren't lucky enough to see any early jungle invasions in this game, as both teams proposed a safe start to the game. Copenhagen Wolves seemed happy to play the farm game for the first minutes, but unfortunately for them it would be Ocelote from SK Gaming grabbing first blood around the 5 minute mark as he annihilated Cowtard in the dragon vicinity, granting SK Gaming an early 1k gold advantage.

For the surprise of many of us at home, the Copenhagen Wolves managed to mount an impressive comeback, managing to rack a 1k gold advantage by the 19 minute mark. For the next minutes, both teams would settle for a bit of farm, as they both tried to avoid confrontation. It wouldn't be until minute 31, when Copenhagen Wolves decided to push the mid lane, that SK Gaming would have a chance at coming back into this game. During the push Copenhagen Wolves committed too far, and SK Gaming´s Ocelote managed to secure a quadra-kill, allowing him and his team to quickly secure a free baron. All in all, SK Gaming had managed to take back the gold count into their favor, as they now had a 1k gold advantage.

At this point, SK Gaming just had to suffocate Copenhagen Wolves by pushing the lanes and outfarming them. Thanks to the amount of pressure applied to each lane, SK Gaming managed to secure a somewhat free baron once again, this time  at minute 40, extending their gold lead to around 5k.

Copenhagen Wolves knew their time was ending, and SK Gaming knew this. This meant Copenhagen Wolves had to at least try to push, and that's exactly what they were doing in the mid lane around the 48 minute mark, when out of the river came all of SK Gaming looking for the final fight. Copenhagen Wolves didn't have much to do, and SK Gaming made good use of their 10k gold advantage at that point to completely obliterate the 5 players from Copenhagen Wolves from the map. After the fight SK Gaming marched directly towards the nexus of Copenhagen Wolves, which they had no problem in taking down. This victory marked the 3rd one for Ocelote and company this season, meaning they were now sitting at 3 wins and only 1 loss.

aAa vs Gambit Gaming:

Russia vs France in this match that marked the first appearance of the French team in this season of the Championship Series. aAa had nothing to lose coming into this match, and they had already proven everyone wrong when they surprisingly managed to qualify for this season. On the other hand, Gambit Gaming were the clear favorites, having recently beaten top Korean teams at IEM Katowice most of the fans were convinced of their chances coming into this match.

Picks:

aAa:

Gambit:

Bans:

aAa:

Gambit:

The game started out without any kind of jungle aggression, as both teams secured their buffs without any problems. Coming into the laning phase, aAa decided to swap their top and bottom lanes, leaving Kennen solo in the bot lane against Caitlyn and Lulu, while they sent Graves and Sona top lane against the KhaZix from Gambit Gaming. The lane swap allowed aAa to quickly pick up the first turret of the game as Shen came up to the top lane for a quick 3 man push against the turret just as the timer was reaching the 4 minute mark. Gambit  Gaming replied to the early turret from aAa by quickly heading down to secure a simple 4-man dragon.

Just as the clocked reached the 13 minute mark, and just after Lux managed to build her Rod of Ages, aAa decided to head down to Dragon pit in order to try and secure the extra gold. aAa placed a pink ward down, but failed to actually spot the ward from Gambit Gaming in the dragon area, which allowed Gambit Gaming to storm the river just as aAa secure the Dragon. aAa then decided to back off, but it was too little too late, as Gambit Gaming managed to secure a 3 for nothing exchange with the help of Karthus´s ult. With this, Gambit Gaming managed to secure a 1k gold advantage.

From that point on, all Gambit Gaming had to do was play safe and slowly secure the objectives on the map, which they did to great avail. Just 20 minutes into the game, the Russians had already secured a 3k gold advantage, which meant they were the ones to set the pace of the game from there onwards.

As the clock reached minute 34, the pressure from Gambit Gaming had started to create a toll on the strength of aAa, as the gold advantage for the Russians was now sitting at 10k. In order to extend the lead even further, Gambit Gaming conducted a 3-man push down the mid lane, while Karthus and Vi secured a totally free Baron, leaving the gold advantage at 12k after all of the action came to an end. From then on, all Gambit Gaming had to do was cruise down the mid lane to secure the first inhibitor of the game, which happened at minute 36 and which saw Gambit Gaming secure a 3 for 1 exchange as well as the inhibitor turret and the inhibitor in the mid lane.

The final push for Gambit Gaming would come on minute 39 as they secured another 3 for 1 exchange in the base of aAa, proceeding to take down the nexus thereafter. With this victory, Gambit Gaming is now sitting on 2 wins and 2 losses this season.

Time for revenge, SK Gaming vs Evil Geniuses

Probably the most awaited match of the day was the one that faced SK Gaming and Evil Geniuses in a re-match of what we saw last weekend, where SK Gaming managed to overcome Snoopeh and company. Were SK Gaming able to do it again, or did Evil Geniuses take revenge for what happened last weekend ?. Read and find out.

Picks:

EG:

SK:

Bans:

EG:

SK:

Starting this match, Evil Geniuses looked interested in making a play for SK´s red buff, but ultimately decided to play it safe and back away to secure their own buffs first. SK Gaming positioned themselves in a defensive way throughout their jungle to make sure that no surprises were coming their way. Ultimately, both teams secured their buffs without any complications.

Unfortunately for the spectators, none of the teams replicated their aggresive playstyle from last weekend, as they decided it was the best idea to play it safe this time around. First blood was almost secured by EG in the bot lane as they almost managed to take down CandyPanda´s Twitch with a well coordinated attack, but in the end the German player managed to come out alive.

First blood would arrive at minute 8, when a well timed gank from Xin Zhao secured SK Gaming´s Nyph a kill over the Sona from Evil geniuses. It wasn't the most ideal first blood as it went to the support, but it was nonetheless firstblood and allowed them to reduce the gold deficit to only 200 gold on favor of Evil Genisues.

Just as the clock reached the 25 minute mark, Evil Geniuses decided to push down the mid lane taking advantage of the fact that Ocelote´s Nidalee was out of mana. A well utilized Lux combo managed to force SK Gaming´s ADC back from the inhibitor turret, but Evil Geniuses decided to back away as SK Gaming fiercely defended the turret.

Around the 33 minute mark Evil Geniuses took another go at the middle lane inhibitor turret, as they pressure SK Gaming for some tense seconds. Ultimately, a  great combo from Froggen´s Lux managed to take down Candy Panda, which left things as a 5 v 4 in favor of Evil geniuses. With such a favorable situation, Evil Geniuses were finally able to destroy the first inhibitor turret of the game, proceeding then to also destroy the middle inhibitor, which left SK Gaming fairly behind. Just after the play that secured them an inhibitor, Evil geniuses moved to baron, managing to secure it, but losing 3 man in the process, which took the gold advantage back to 7k still in favor of Evil Geniuses.

Finally, as the clock reached minute 45, Evil geniuses managed to win the final battle inside of SK Gaming´s base, allowing them to take down the 2 nexus turrets and finally the nexus to secure the victory.

With this victory Evil Geniuses is now sitting on top of the rankings with 4 wins and only 1 loss. On the other hand, SK Gaming sits on 2nd place with 3 wins and 2 losses.

This was all for day 1 of week 2 at the EU LCS Season 3, but the action will continue today starting at 18:00 CET with the match between Evil Geniuses and the Spaniards from Giants Gaming. We will bring you another recap tomorrow from what happens today at EU LCS Season 3, so be sure to stay tuned !