Worlds 2026 Swiss Stage Days 5-7 — T1, IG and TES qualify; G2, CFO and Team Liquid eliminated

Three more tickets for the quarterfinals

Movistar KOI gave T1 a real fight in the opener. The Spanish side won the first skirmishes, with Elyoya and Alvaro moving well together, but T1 never waited for the game to come to them. They found picks in the jungle, built a lead, and even after MKOI won a teamfight at dragon, the decisive Soul fight went T1's way when Choi "Doran" Hyeon-joon caught David "Supa" Martínez García and turned the fight from there. Game two left no room for doubt. T1 led early, controlled the dragons and gave MKOI nothing, with Doran again cutting through on Gwen as the MVP of the series. T1 reach the Knockout Stage for the sixth time since 2021.

Invictus Gaming needed three games against LYON. The first was all IG. They controlled the early game, Rookie collected a quadra kill on Aurora, the champion that had worked wonders for him against Gen.G, and JiaQi's damage on Yunara buried LYON. In the second, LYON's mid-jungle duo took over and built a big individual lead. IG stacked dragons, and JiaQi was devastating on Jhin, one of his signature picks, but LYON were simply too far ahead in the fights to let it slip.

In the decider, Kacper "Inspired" Słoma went all in on the bot lane. The first gank went wrong: IG's Caitlyn had time to stack Lethal Tempo and, after a superb Lux Flash, killed Berserker before trading with Inspired's Xin Zhao. Inspired kept coming with gank after gank, with mixed success, but at 15 minutes JiaQi was already more than 2,300 gold ahead of his opposite number. LYON picked off Rookie in the side lanes, yet IG kept trading towers and objectives, stacked dragons methodically and let their young AD carry tear through LYON. JiaQi was the MVP of the series and keeps raising the bar day after day.

IG are back in the Knockout Stage for the first time in seven years, something Rookie was keen to savour after the series:

The all-LPL clash between Top Esports and Bilibili Gaming opened with an even trade of blows. TES took the dragons while BLG took the side lanes and the towers, and the gold lead BLG built on the top side let them win the decisive fight in the bot-side river. From there, this was the dominant BLG of the season, Knight's Orianna and Xun's rotations leaving nothing to chance. TES then slowed the series right down. In game two, BLG pushed too deep into the enemy jungle and ran into 369's Aatrox, a fight that handed TES four kills, Baron and the equaliser. 369 owned the map on Renekton in the decider, and a clutch play from Creme under Pantheon's ultimate launched JackeyLove's Tristana into orbit. TES closed it in 27 minutes to reach the quarterfinals, while BLG fell back into the problems they had shown earlier and dropped to 2-2.

Survival in Allen

With their backs to the wall, Karmine Corp went for simpler, teamfight-oriented drafts against CTBC Flying Oyster, and game one rolled. Kim "Canna" Chang-dong found a superb flank engage on Galio around the first dragon that blew the game open, and KC's map control did the rest in 27 minutes. Game two was a different story. Doggo had an impressive early game, solo-killing Caliste "Caliste" Henry-Hennebert with his Caitlyn and forcing the French AD carry to play between his two towers, as KC fell 3,500 gold behind by the 15-minute mark.

Canna's Camille turned it around, punishing Caitlyn's lack of mobility and tearing her apart near Baron. Caliste, despite his gold deficit, played with no fear at all, throwing himself into the front line and sacrificing himself to open up the fights, and the several pauses in the game may also have cut CFO's momentum. The finish came at Elder, which KC handled beautifully, catching Shad0w in the bot-side tri-bush and sweeping the fight for a 2-0. CFO leave Worlds as the last LCP team standing, the best result of their region this year, while KC move to 2-2.

Few people would have backed LOS coming into their series against Team Liquid, who had just swept Anyone's Legend and looked to have found their confidence again. LOS took game one around Curse's Trundle. Team Liquid levelled in the second by outscaling their opponents, as Duduhh built a lead on Ezreal but never found the damage to match it, leaving LOS short in teamfights. In the decider, LOS picked Tristana top for Kim "Zest" Dong-min, who killed his opposite number early, took a lead and let his team win the fights. It stayed tight throughout and LOS struggled to snowball, but Tristana's scaling carried them over the line. Sean "Yeon" Sung had a series to forget, and TL go home.

Hanwha Life Esports against G2 Esports was the most anticipated series of the three days, and G2 needed a feat. G2 took a slight early lead in game one with an aggressive invade and a skirmish in the bot lane, but everything turned once the teamfights started. Choi "Zeus" Woo-je was on fire, getting every ounce of value out of K'Sante in fights, and HLE closed the first game in 28 minutes. The second followed the same path, with Zeus's Ambessa breaking the decisive river fight and Kim "Zeka" Geon-woo's Swain zoning G2 out. HLE's solo laners were simply too strong and lived up to their status as MSI champions, finishing the series with 41 kills to 18. G2 leave the Swiss Stage after a disastrous campaign for Europe's first seed, while HLE move to 2-2.

What's next

Round 5 decides the last three quarterfinal spots, all in best-of-threes between 2-2 teams, with the losers going home. LYON and LOS meet in an all-Americas clash between the LCS and the CBLOL. Bilibili Gaming and Hanwha Life Esports face off in a series that will send one of the pre-tournament favourites out in the Swiss Stage.

The headline, though, is Karmine Corp against Movistar KOI. France against Spain, Kameto against Ibai, the biggest rivalry in European League of Legends, with a quarterfinal place on the line, and social media will not be quiet. MKOI knocked KC out of the Summer playoffs at the gates of the final, but KC had the upper hand over them for most of the rest of the year. Only one of them will still be in Allen next week.