The most recent Group Stage – the one in Bangkok was the most intense one the 2018 Overwatch World Cup has seen yet. It had everything that fans love about Overwatch and the World Cup – plenty of action, strong plays, unpredictable results and strong matchups with skilled players.
After three days of matches that took place in front of a live audience in Bangkok’s own Royal Paragon Hall, this Group Stage finally found its conclusion. On the last day, the remaining four teams fought over the two BlizzCon spots available. These 4 teams were China, Australia, Denmark, and Sweden – the two winning teams managed to secure two of the coveted Top 8 spots at this year’s BlizzCon.
China secured their spot early in the day with a stunning performance backed by their (almost) home advantage. Australia, the other winner, took a little longer. The match that enabled their victory was, oddly, one they weren’t actually in. Denmark and Sweden competed, with Sweden winning by a hair’s breath in a tiebreaker.
This put Australia in the ideal spot – they only needed to take one map from China in their last match in order to qualify – Australia did that with incredible ease and more than a dash of skill, allowing them to take the coveted final spot.
That wasn’t all that went on though – the local Thailand team proved that they were more than up to snuff while playing against the best in the world, easily taking a win against team China. Well, easily may be going a bit far as it was in the fifth map of a tiebreaker, however, they still managed to defeat one of the top teams in the world – that’s no small feat.
Now China and Australia get to join the other teams that have already qualified for BlizzCon earlier this year – South Korea, Finland, the US, and Canada. They and two more as of yet undecided teams will compete at BlizzCon in November – the last two teams will be decided this weekend at the final Group Stage in Paris this weekend.
The all European match-up there will see the UK, Germany, Italy, France, Poland, and the Netherlands competing for the last two spots in the final held in the US. Over Friday, Saturday and Sunday, the six teams will compete in their matches which you can watch streamed all over the world in order to determine the last (but not least!) two competitors to join the others in the World Cup finals.
Poland, in particular, has many people watching this year – not only did they come up with the ‘#proland’, but last year, after being grouped with North Korea, they came in third after the Netherlands and Korea. Not only does that mean a rematch this year, but the team also swapped out almost its entire team – only one player remained the same. This makes them an unknown in this year’s match-up, though nothing is decided yet – not until this weekend anyway!
