2020 LEC Power Rankings
The 2019 season was a successful and historic year in establishing Europe’s finest as a true powerhouse and a fierce competitor on the international stage. Europe has now made back-to-back World Championship finals but fell at the final hurdle both times. Despite losing in the past two World Championship finals, European League of Legends is looking brighter than ever and heading into 2020, each player on every team possess the belief that Europe can go all the way this year, making the League of Legends European Championship (LEC) an even tougher league to conquer.
With G2 at the forefront of the international success, the LEC won its first international trophy since Season One (2011) at the Mid Season Invitational last year (MSI 2019). Ahead of the 2020 LEC Spring Split, which kicks off on 24 January, the team’ll share the thoughts on the offseason along with a power ranking of how the team expect the league to shape up. The power ranking is based on individual and team performances from 2019 alongside the roster changes made to each organization for 2020. For all the information on the new starting rosters for the 2020 LEC season, see the LEC roster tracker.
Each tier is ranked in order of power ranking (i.e. Excel > Mad Lions > Team Vitality).
All statistics used in this article are taken from Oracle’s Elixir.
S+ Tier
G2 Esports
G2 Esports has been fairly quiet over the offseason for an organization that prides itself on being outspoken and boisterous. They have retained their starting roster from the 2019 season and also decided to swap Perkz back to the mid lane and Caps to the bottom lane.
Luka “Perkz” Perković cemented himself as one of the great western League of Legends players of all time in 2019, retaining a fresh outlook and mentality on the game by role swapping to the bottom lane, demonstrating his sheer skill and game knowledge by dominating the competition as both a middle laner and bot laner in his inaugural year as a marksman. During the 2019 Spring Regular Season, Perkz netted himself the most kills, most assists, highest damage per minute, and highest average earned gold per minute as he effortlessly swapped roles and put up ridiculous performances week in week out.
Although Perkz’s performances were stellar, he did have the best support in Europe by his side, Mihael “Mikyx” Mehle. He has the minor edge over Zdravets “Hylissang” Iliev Galabov for Europe’s number one support due to Hylissang’s inconsistencies. Mikyx is the perfect combination of mechanical skill and map awareness that you want in your support, he’s the only support in the league that could role swap to another lane, similarly to Perkz, and still dominate the LEC, especially on his mid lane Gragas.
Every member of G2 Esports in 2019 was considered to be the best of their roles in Europe and in the top 5 globally. Martin “Wunder” Nordahl Hansen, Marcin “Jankos” Jankowski, and Mikyx were all shining lights on their previous team before joining G2 Esports. For Jankos and Wunder, their debut year at G2 was not their most successful year in terms of accomplishments as Fnatic won both EU LCS titles in 2018, albeit their run at the World Championships was something to be proud of. The ballsy addition of Caps and moving Perkz to the bot lane alongside Mikyx in 2019 was something many were skeptical about at first, but it sure paid off as each member on G2 Esports solidified themselves as the most individually talented players Europe has produced. For so long the “European Superteam” would never manage to make its mark, but individual performances from each member and the ability to carry from each role placed G2 Esports right at the top of the professional League of Legends scene, thus heading into 2020, the team expect no less from this lineup.
Jankos’ 2019 season was by far the most historic and successful season for the Polish jungler. Racking up the Summer MVP award, two LEC titles, winning the 2019 Mid Season Invitational, and almost completing the ‘Grand Slam’ (winning both domestic and international titles) but ultimately finishing second in the 2019 Worlds Championship. For a jungler that prior to 2019 hadn’t won any ‘major titles’, 2019 was Jankos’ best year as he dominated the jungle in Europe, he put up some serious numbers with 73 kills, 166 assists, a KDA (kill, death, assist) ratio of 6.0 and an average gold difference of +171 at 10 minutes over his jungling opponents. If any player was going to make a role look broken, that is often criticized by the League of Legends community for lacking the potential to carry games and be the difference-maker, Jankos would be that player, regardless of how many experience nerfs Riot throws at the Jungle role. Jankos has always worn his heart on his sleeve, his passion knows no bounds as he even managed to pass out in celebration after defeating Fnatic in the LEC Summer playoffs final. Expect Jankos to continue to dominate the jungle in Europe as long as he stays dedicated and enjoys what he is doing as the Jankos under G2 is a different beast to the Jankos of previous years and organizations.