Garen and Teemo make their first appearance at League of Legends Worlds 2022

League of Legends Worlds 2022 stormed into its third match-day, while Day 2 was successful in making a significant mark with a few extraordinary draft picks.

Istanbul Wild Cats and Isurus surprised the Worlds arena by locking in Garen and Teemo for their top lanes respectively. However, the picks didn't really succeed in doing wonders as both the TCL and LLA representatives failed to win against Chinese League of Legends heavyweight Royal Never Give Up.

League of Legends Worlds has never failed to surprise the community with its exquisite draft picks and unorthodox off-meta builds, and this year is no different.

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Teemo and Garen get their debut League of Legends Worlds 2022 lock-ins

In their play-in match versus RNG, Isurus - the LLA's representatives at the 2022 League of Legends World Championship - locked-in Teemo, the Swift Scout, with their top laner Kang "ADD" Geon-mo, fetching ecstatic applause from the home audience.

Prior to playing the champion twice yesterday, ADD had never picked Teemo in his professional career and as everyone expected, he failed to succeed, resulting in a disastrous KDA of 1/9/3.

Similarly, the Turkish League Giants handed Garen, the Might of Demacia, to their top laner Soner "StarScreen" Kaya in the fifth match of the day against RNG. Although the Istanbul Wild Cats failed to win the contest, Garen showcased a decent performance on Baron Lane, pulling in a KDA of 5/5/1.

In the competition's history, Teemo has been selected for Worlds four times. It currently has a poor winning percentage on the global stage. However, it has shocked fans universally each time it has been used because they never anticipated that the Swift Scout, one of the League's most infamously despised champions, would be the one team choosing to find a victory.

Gnar, Aatrox, and Ornn have all made multiple appearances at Worlds so far, and it is anticipated that they will all continue to be priority selections for the duration of the competition because of the current top-lane meta.

However, Teemo and Garen don't offer as much versatility as these other choices and hence don't get frequent picks in pro play.

Teemo has always been a tough nut for many players to lane against due to his ability to poison, blind, and slow opponents - several of these can be done while the champion is invisible. As a result, they have also portrayed the Swift Scout as one of the League's most hated champions.

Unfortunately, Isurus' first victory at the play-in stage couldn't be achieved with this option, making it virtually impossible for the LLA representatives to move on to the group stage.

But the team's ability to incite the audience at home with a straightforward lock-in of the despised Yordle will make the League of Legends draft memorable.