On the 4th, despite Clutch Gaming's rough road in the play-in stages, they defeated Unicorns of Love in the tiebreaker match and became the 1st seed in their group to move onto the knockout stage.

The mid laner, Damonte, was interviewed in both the LCK and the Riot Games Channel, so the following are his words from both.

Congratulations on 1st seed for the group. You had to play vs. UoL for the 3rd time, but it seems like you’ve had an easier time this game. Can you tell us what happened?

I think that in the first 2 games, they got the best of us with the Heimerdinger pick, and it was hard for us to play against that because no one in NA plays Heimer in the bot lane. We’re used to playing vs. more standard team comps, but people are starting to play different picks at Worlds, so while we weren’t expecting it, we weren’t playing at our best at the same time.

Can you tell us about the Mordekaiser and Vi blind pick from the enemy team?

They both were high-damage, single target champions. I think we caught them off-guard when we banned Nocturne, because they showed that they were willing to play against Syndra if they had Nocturne. I think they were going for more niche pick, but we were able to play our game.

Looking at some stats, you’ve played a total of 45 games, including your gauntlet run, last season. You’ve had to play in the play-in stages straight after that, so how do you deal with burnout?

We’re pretty used to it by now, and a lot of matches, if anything, is never a bad thing. Assuming that we win our upcoming best-of-5s, we’re pretty happy that we get to play in the play-in stages as a set of warm up matches for the group stages. 

What did you learn from the play-in stages?

We’ve learned that Heimerdinger’s pretty OP (Laughter).

Moving onto the knockout stages of the play-in stages, which team would you like to face, and which team would you like to avoid?

I’m not trying to be mean, but I’m not entirely sure of all the teams that’ll be seeded into the 2nd seed. I’d love to play against Isurus Gaming, as their mid laner, Seiya, played NA solo queue for the longest time, so it would be cool to face off against him. As for DAMWON, I’m assuming they’ll be getting out of groups as 1st seed, so I don’t think we’ll be facing against them.