EDward Gaming beats defending champion DK to win LoL Worlds 2021

BEIJING -- China's EDward Gaming edged defending champions DWG KIA of South Korea 3-2 to win the 2021 League of Legend (LoL) World Championship in Reykjavik, Iceland on Saturday.

This is the maiden LoL world championship title for the renowned Chinese club, who has six domestic league titles to its name, but never made it to the last four at the worlds before. Mid laner Lee "Scout" Ye-chan was named FMVP.

"I have faced a lot of challenges and experienced a lot of failures. After all those efforts I am able to lift the trophy with EDG, this makes me really happy," said Lee.

The worlds championship victory completed the Grand Slam of support Tian "Meiko" Ye, who has won the 2015 Mid Season Invitational and Spring and Summer Split titles in China's LoL Pro League with EDG.

"I started the journey with EDG in 2015 and had a brilliant start, along with difficulties and adversities. Being able to win the world championship after all these years of persistence, it's been all worth it," said 23-year-old Tian.

EDG, the only non-South Korean team in the last four and underdog before the final, stunned DK in the opening game of the final, before the defending champion answered with two wins thanks to their excellent team fight. Jungler Zhao "Jiejie" Lijie paced EDG to victory in the fourth game and forced a decider, where the EDG players bettered their opponents to kill the Elder Dragon and the Baron Nashor before claiming the eventual victory.

EDG thus became the third Chinese team to win the LoL worlds, after Invictus Gaming in 2018 and FunPlus Phoenix in 2019.