PUBG Champions League (PCL) 2020 Fall Season Finals Preview
The League Stage for the Fall Season of PUBG Champions League (PCL) 2020 is now complete. After a series of 90 matches, we know the sixteen teams that will battle in the Grand Finals, set for October 19–23, for the PCL title, a lion share of a 2,000,000 CNY (~300,000 USD) prize pool and six spots in the November’s PUBG Continental Series 3 Asia.
Heading into a deciding Best-of-30 series, each of the teams will start with 10% of their League Stage points (for ex. Tianba and OMG will start with 44 points each). That being said, let’s take a look at the sixteen squads standing…
Tianba
Even with “T1antian“ deciding to waste his poten … I mean move to Change The Game club before the Fall split, Tianba still looks as strong as ever after taking the top spot in the League Stage. Three of their core pieces — “NN“ (Linshu), “M200“ and “LuRen“ are still here, but the team is now backed up by “mingz1“, which joined the team from Weibo and quickly took the fourth starting spot from “Z9Max“. On one side, Tianba looks destined to finally claim the top spot in China, but they’ve been in this spot and failed to take the final step before — will the history repeat or is it finally their time?
Oh My God
After a year-long rebuild, OMG is finally back on the PCL Finals stage with a totally different roster from their 2019 Summer one. In fact, the only link to the team that was dominating in China and at PGI in 2018 left is “Xiaorong”, which returned from KX to become the team’s coach. The rest of the team however has been built back from scratch by either signing the talented players from disbanded teams like “Xbei” from SSS and “MinMie” from FPX, or giving time and a chance to a new talent like “Fugue”, “mudhh” and “xwudd”. The result of that is OMG winning 10 of the 60 games they played in Regular Season — the only team to hit the double digit wins there. That comes with a catch though, as they nearly got as many points in those 10 games (207) as in all remaining games (233). At the moment, it looks like the only thing that can stop OMG from the PCL championship is themselves.
Four Angry Men
This team will never die, will they? Heading into the PCL Fall, I thought that THIS will be the season of rebuilding for the team owned by “GodV/We1less/We1st”. I thought that they’ll lack firepower after “ZGG01” retired — “CRAZY112” quickly steps up with a top 10-level numbers in his maiden season in the team. I had doubts whether “Forever” can deliver great performance as in the past — he proves me wrong with 75 kills in 60 games and numbers really close to the ones from “xxxLu” and Crazy. I thought 4AM will struggle with “Godv” not putting as much time as before in the offseason, but that didn’t happen and they’re now looking forward to challenge for their second PCL trophy.
Infantry Clan
Speaking of teams that’s always in the run, iFTY is still here looking to become the first team to win the back-to-back premier titles on the Chinese scene. Things are as usual for them so far, with “9” and “Longskr” both in the top 5 fraggers for the Regular Season, each with over 85 kills in 60 games, “Jiaoyang” leading them as their in-game leader and “Boliang” as iFTY’s support player. For them, the goal is really simple — win.
NEXT
After finishing 18th in the Spring and 16th in the Summer Season, NEXT have continued their rise by finishing in the top 5 in the Fall Regular Season. This up-and-coming team have finally found their way to consistently perform well, which was their main problem in the past, and it’s looking to fight for at least a spot in the PCS3 Asia. As for their players, while the team have a strong and consistent backbone in “AZ” and “Ming”, the one to watch is definitely “HS”, who’s been their top fragger for a while and may be amongst the most underrated players on the Chinese scene at the moment.
NewHappy
For the third consecutive season, NewHappy have made their way back to the Finals of the PCL with a very good Regular Season result, hoping to improve on from their 10th and 15th place finish in the Spring and Summer Finals respectively. This can be their best shot however, as their frontline fragger “xkkk” and support in “likeNan” both had yet another good season, lead by their new IGL in “Giao”, which have joined the team after the disbandment of 1246. And then there’s “Mming” — the 2020 PCL Spring MVP has been amongst the best players throughout the year and it continues this season as well as he’s the top fragger of the league after the League Stage. He’s still yet to deliver when it matters though, and without him stepping up for once in the Finals, NewHappy may end up missing on the top spots yet again.
Kaixin Gaming
On a paper, Kaixin Gaming have everything needed to be the amongst the best in the world. “Cobra” is a force of nature, finishing as the top fragger of PCL 2020 Summer, the 4th best one in Summer and not slowing down a bit in Fall so far. And he’s backed up by a experienced “Dy577”, a rising star in “LilGhost” and a strong IGL and one of the best snipers in the world in “Yuren”. There’s only one problem — they never can get the job done.
Cobra and Yuren couldn’t make the job done in PCL Summer 2019, back under the Ark banner and with “Mad98” to back them up. They haven’t shown up in Spring 2020 Finals, finishing 14th and leading the team to sign Dy577 to back them up. And in Summer, they pretty much had one hand on a PCS2 Asia, only to not score a single placement point in last 7 games and lose it by 2 points to 4AM in the final round. Will this happen again or will KX not choke when it counts in Fall?
Lao Yue Gou
Five months ago, LYG was at their results peak after taking the second place in both the PCL Spring and PCS Charity Showdown. Nine weeks ago, they were at the lowest, finishing 6th in the PCL Preseason Fall and not making their way back to the top division on results alone. But LYG have gambled, likely with the check they got from 4AM to transfer “CRAZY112”, bought their way back to the PCL and didn’t look back since. With “MiGo” and “Maps” still in the team and both doing as well as they did in Spring, and a new yet experienced blood in “Dec12th” (remember him from PNC?) and “Shmily”, LYG battles once again for a place on the global stage, and maybe more.
MultiCircle Gaming
After a 10th place in the PCL Summer, MCG continues to make their place as one of the upper-ranked teams, heading to the Fall Finals from the 9th place. In difference to the teams ahead of them, MCG doesn’t have a single player that steps up ahead of everyone. Instead, they rely more on a fairly decent and consistent performance from their players “995iTank”, “LingDu”, “EviLLee” under the in-game leadership from the former VC Gaming member and PCL champion in “Summer”.
My Queen
Coming to PCL as arguably the winners of the roster shuffle that was forced on the Chinese scene by cutting the number of PCL teams from 48 to 24 ahead of the Fall Season, MQ have finally qualified to the League Finals from the pretty safe 10th position. But while making here is already a good result from them, they have a roster that can battle for the PCS invite. While two of MQ’s mainstays, “95k” and “sp1ce” are team’s backbone, it’s their two new signings — “T2de” (formerly known as Tide in VC/4AM family) and “AzEeeeee” (finally freed from EDG) that are pushing the team into their next level.
Royal Never Give Up
Even though RNG had lost three of their best players throughout 2020 — “Rain” and “tiaotiaohu” due to their retirements, and “XDD” due to the 50M CNY (7M USD) contract dispute (more about it HERE), they’re still fighting strong on the Chinese scene. Their firepower is amongst the best in the region, with “Loong”, “ZpYan1” and “XiaoA1sy” all being capable of carrying the team, but they’re often making a rotational mistake or take a battle too much before getting punished severly for that. It’s things like this that RNG needs to improve in order to improve from their 10th place in Spring and 14th in Summer.
Petrichor Road
Speaking of “XDD”, the team he formed after leaving RNG have made it to their PCL Finals after missing it by 2 points in the Summer Playoffs. The man himself is unsurprisingly still a in-game beast, sitting in the top 3 in most of the stats for the Fall so far, and the team improved quite a lot as for their strategy and tactical play, thanks a lot to their coach / PCL commentator in “Missivy”, but it takes consistency and more than one player to succedd in PUBG. And PeRo may still lack those two, as none of the remaining team members — “longdd”, “Mamu” “Monsters”, “Myl” — had scored more than half of kills XDD did, and the team is still uncertain on whether Myl or longdd should be their fourth starting player. That being said, those guys know first-hand that things can turn to their side at any time, and PeRo shouldn’t be underestimated by anyone.
QuanMing Gaming
Starting the Fall Finals nearly in the same position in which they’ve finished in Summer (12th back then, 13th after Fall RS), QM Gaming is aiming to pull off yet another upset and advance to their first global event since finishing 12th in the Global Championship last Fall. Two players, “YIZeeeeee” and “ScccWF” (ex Wufeng) to be exact, remains from the team that played in Oakland — joining them for this run is a impressive frontline attacker from 1246 in “THEJUe” and a newer talent in “Desire”, “Hero” and “Yuq1Flower”. On paper, QM should be one of the weakest squads in the Final 16, but they’re more than capable to surprise everyone.
Team Still Moving Under Gunfire
Well…you’ve made it I guess. Team SMG had a very good start of the Regular Season, placing 5th at the halfway mark with 206 points after 30 games, but they couldn’t manage to retain their form in the second half of the stage and ended just a few points above the playoffs bubble. Between “Mad98” not making the Longskr’s numbers as he did in Summer, the form of “Baolei” falling off the cliff for about the fifth time since he joined 17/SMG and having to be replaced by “sixgod”, and some questionable leadership coming from “lanren”, there’s a lot that SMG needs to improve leading into the title race. This should be the part when I just say that “Shou” will carry them like he always did, but he’s stuck in the PCL jail for the time being, and they have to rely on “Shox” and Mad98 to carry SMG this time around.
Last-minute side note: Mad98 has been sent to the hospital for treatment due to feeling unwell, and his current PCL Finals status is unclear. Source
Wolves Esports
The PUBG Esports division of Wolverhampton Wanderers football club, or the “Weibo 2.0” as I call them for signing experienced players with a quite sizable fees, have made it to their first Finals in their third PCL season after being close to do it last season (19th in Summer). And while they’re far from best when it comes to the late-game plays just yet, they’ve improved significantly attack-wise thanks to the ever-consistent results from “067” and a small career renaissance of “yyxovo”. The player I keep an eye for though is “meRcy” — a former fragging powerhouse for FPX have been underperforming ever since that team disbanded at the end of 2019, but his potential return to glory can be what Wolves need to surprise and advance to PCS3.
Triumphant Song Gaming
If the PCS2 Asia finish wasn’t enough to give the TSG fans a heart attack, that the team having an up-and-down Regular Season and making it to the Finals only in the 16th place with a win in the very final match had to do it’s’ job. There were moments, especially in the latter half of the League split, when TSG looked like the reigning PCS2 Asia champions, but inconsistency, a lot of errors and an overall weak form of their players, especially from the PCS2 Asia MVP in “911x” have nearly costed them a place in the Final 16. PCL Fall Finals will start with a (mostly) clear sheet though, and if TSG clears out their issues, the championship can as well be in their reach.
