On the 14th, SKT took down Clutch Gaming to secure their 3rd victory in the group stages of the 2019 LoL World Championship. As many have predicted, SKT grabbed a very dominating victory against NA’s 3rd seed team, and went undefeated in round 1 of the group stages.

Bang, Inven Global’s special correspondent, joined SKT’s coach, KkOma, to talk about the victory and the team’s mindset in this tournament.

Congratulations on taking down Clutch Gaming. How do you feel?

With today’s victory, we’re now 3-0 in the group stages, but even if we’re currently undefeated, complacency can cause us to lose all our matches in round 2, so we’re only focused on how we’re going to improve, so we don’t feel too relieved for our current 3-0 record.

When Clutch Gaming has been confirmed for group C, many people have been saying that your group is ‘The Group of Death.’ However, SKT’s been performing really well in groups, so did you feel pressured at all for being in ‘The Group of Death’?

We didn’t really think about it, because no matter what group we were in, if we’re complacent, we would be in ‘The Group of Death’. Our goal is to go much higher in the tournament, and we’re going to meet the teams we need to anyways. Even if we lost to a team, we’d look back on our mistakes, not repeat those mistakes and beat our opponents, so that nickname held no meaning.

Out of a 100, how would you rate your team’s performance?

I’m always asked this question. If you look at today’s performance, it was very clean, but there are many factors that can affect a team’s performance, such as a player’s health. So if I’m being brutally greedy, I think the team can perform much better. So I hope that the players, and the coaching staff can become a little more ambitious in performing better.

If you look at other groups, a team that’s also been dominant so far is G2 Esports. What are your thoughts on G2’s performance? Or is there a different team that you’re keeping an eye out for?

Personally, teams that looked either scary or needed to be aware of were IG and G2. They’re both teams that won championships before, and they perform on a very high level, so they’re only going to get better, and we need to be extra prepared against those two teams.

4 years ago, at the Mercedez-Benz Arena, just beside where we are now, is where SKT won Worlds. Do you remember back then? If you do, how do you feel? Do you feel as if you’re receiving positive vibes?

Of course. There’s nothing but good memories, it’s a place where we played with you, Bang. Looking back, I think there’s nothing but good memories.

Lastly, can you share some words of resolution to the fans cheering for SKT?

At the moment, we’re taking things quite slow, because our goal is to basically play every single game that we can and win. We know that even if we lose, we fix our mistakes and make sure to not lose. I hope that fans will continue to support and cheer for us, and no matter what it takes, we’ll make sure we’ll get to the top. Also, the players and the coaches are all working hard on things like expanding our champion pool, so please send your love and support to everyone on the squad as well. That goes for my dear Jun-sik as well. I’m personally rooting for him a lot. Jun-sik, fighting.