Fnatic secured their first win of the 2023 LEC season after starting 0-2 against the likes of G2 Esports and Team Vitality.
Fnatic came into the League of Legends European Championship 2023 season with high expectations. The organization brought back fan-favorite bot laner Carl Martin Erik ‘Rekkles’ Larsson and promoted support Rúben ‘Rhuckz’ Barbosa and coach Gonçalo ‘Crusher’ Pinto Brandão from the Academy team to the main squad.
But Fnatic started the season with two losses in their two opening matches against Team Vitality and G2 Esports before securing a win to close out the week against KOI. Fnatic’s jungler Iván ‘Razork’ Martín Díaz said in a post-match interview on the LEC broadcast that the start is not exactly what the team expected.
“I think we have had a rough weekend,” Razork said. “The first game against Vitality it was in our hands we actually threw [that game] and it felt really bad. The game against G2, I feel it was completely unplayable… With the win against KOI right now it relieves us a little bit, going 1-2, and we are looking forward to next week.”
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Fnatic go 1-2 in first week of LEC
While people will not understand, this weekend was quite ok. We played 2/3 very solid games. It's true that we threw one of them and therefore result is 1-2 but the goal is not to be 1st on this first part of the split rather than arrive strong to the latest parts.#AlwaysFnatic
— Javier 'Dardo' Zafra (@dardo_lol) January 23, 2023
While fans might not enjoy how Fnatic, and the return of Rekkles, has started out, the management at Fnatic isn’t ready to throw in the towel just yet.
“The goal is not to be 1st on this first part of the split rather than arrive strong to the latest parts,” Fnatic’s Director of League of Legends, Javier Zafra, said.
Fnatic now sits in the bottom half of the standing in the league heading into the second week. They join Excel Esports, Team Heretics, Team BDS and SK Gaming at 1-2. Astralis is now the only team in the league without a win after the first set of matches in the Winter Split.