The cards have been shuffled, played, and the winners have been declared. After 10 days the 2019 League of Legends World Championship's Groups Stage concluded with Group D determining which two teams it would send to the quarter finals. It was close until the final game, but reigning world champion Invictus Gaming grabbed their ticket to the next stage with a dominant victory over Team Liquid.

We spoke to the team's AD Carry, Yu "JackeyLove" Wen-Bo, straight after the match. He opened up about the journey to the quarter finals, told us what he thinks held North American teams back, and looks forward to the knockout stage set to commence in Madrid next week.

First of all, congratulations with making it to the quarter finals. What's going through your mind now?

By making it to the knockout stage, I have the opportunity to fight back against all the mistakes I made in the previous matches. It will be a good moment to recover from that. I just want to perform better in the next match.

Today was intense. How did you prepare for today?

I didn't feel much pressure. After the first victory of today our conditions were good, we were very relaxed. The loss of the second match didn't have much influence on our state of mind. If we would just play well, as we do normally, we would easily win that last match.

Was there no extra pressure for the last match, against Team Liquid? It was all or nothing, after all.

I didn't feel any extra pressure. I personally feel more relaxed at these international big tournaments.

It was a very dominant game against Team Liquid. Did you expect that?

In terms of the draft: if we play well in the early game, we'd definitely win the game. We played quite well in the laning phase, so I was confident we would be victorious.

How do you feel about your personal performance throughout the tournament so far?

I'm not satisfied with my own performance. There were two scenarios I wasn't happy with. Sometimes I was too careless, and made mistakes by being too aggressive. But other times I wanted to stay stable or safe too much, and I lost opportunities to win teamfights.

In the end, we made it to the quarter finals and I'm happy about that, because I can prove myself there.

We have three European teams, three Korean teams and two Chinese teams in the knockout stage. What do you think about this?

I think in general it's an ok representation of the region strength. I think maybe RNG's loss against Fnatic is a pity.

The LCS has no representatives, why do you think that is?

I think they were kind of unlucky. Their opponents all played surprising drafts, and prepared very well. I think their 'secret weapons' were used against NA teams.

You're facing Griffin in the quarter finals. How do you feel about them?

I'm looking forward to the Best of 5. They have their strengths and so do we. It's hard to tell how it will turn out. I think in the first round we didn't do well, but then in the second round we prepared very well, just like Griffin.

Let's say you make it out of the quarter finals. You'll face either FunPlus Phoenix or Fnatic there. Which of the two would you like to play against?

I want to meet FunPlus, although I do think we could beat Fnatic. I think it's better to face teams from the LPL region in the semi finals though. I'm more familiar with that team, because we've played so many matches against them in the LPL, so that gives more confidence.