After yet another disappointing finish to a difficult split, Counter Logic Gaming has begun the rebuilding process of its League of Legends team by letting go of head coach Kim “SSONG” Sang-soo and coach Weldon Green.
These past few years have been tough for CLG fans. In 2019, the team showed promise when they finished third in the 2019 LCS Summer Split but were eliminated from the playoffs by Clutch Gaming. Even still, it wasn’t a bad outcome when compared to their abysmal play over the three previous splits.
When 2020 rolled along, the roster had brought in familiar faces like Lee “Crown” Min-ho and Andy “Smoothie” Ta to bolster their power ahead of the new decade.
They also picked up head coach SSONG to help lead the team in the right direction. This move unfortunately failed to gel together, and CLG finished the Spring Split in last place with a 3-15 record.
This past summer was just as bad from CLG. They brought back veteran mid laner Eugene “Pobelter” Park to try and return some semblance of normalcy to the lineup, but even his efforts could not carry the team to success. With a final tiebreaker loss to Team Dignitas, the roster dropped out of playoff contention with a 5-13 record.
Although things might look bad, there are a few pieces that can be salvaged from this wreck of the season. Pobelter looked revitalized as the starting mid laner of an LCS team, and his play looked decent in such dire circumstances. There are also multiple pieces that could grow into even better players if given better guidance.
Earlier this year, CLG parted ways with Crown. The departure came just three months and thirteen days after Crown joined the team. Reading through the replies, you can automatically see quite a bit of anger from the fans. One decently liked tweet places the blame on Weldon Green, the head coach for CLG, for flubbing the roster. The user states that Weldon was responsible for the roster, communication, and the mental health of players before bluntly calling the head coach a failure and putting the entirety of the blame on him.
With such a short stint on the team, it’s understandable why he hasn’t claimed any accolades while playing for them. Still, Crown is considered one of the best active players at the moment, especially among his favored mid-lane role.
The year might be done, but the work has just begun for CLG.
