On Tuesday August 22nd, the third Overwatch Contender Cup commenced. This was the final regular Overwatch Contender Cup series that would determine who enters the group stages.
Currently the four dominant teams in the Premiership are Team EndPoint, Team StartSpot, Team Last Resort and Computerised Gamers. With these four pretty much set to get into the groups, what will happen for the other four spots? Let’s find out.
The Third Contender Cup Bracket:
To no surprise, the brackets results seemed normal. Seeding seemed correct and the seeds were spaced out. Naturally, the four big teams flew to the semis as expected; however, the little teams are the focus here.
Unfortunately, the Premiership didn’t have enough numbers for the lower half teams to play in the RO16. This means there was no real way to identify the better teams and so this created seeding problems.
Disappointingly, there are now six teams tied at seventh (as Choke’s Overwatch team no longer exist – see ‘Who will take the final slots?’ for more info).
So there only two slots up for grabs. Although, two of the recurring participants of the tournament, Soggy Biscuit and Cognate eSports, had played all three weeks consistently, which was enough for them to claim the fifth and sixth place positions into the groups stages.
Who will take the final slots?
A few weeks ago, Choke Gaming announced that it will be ceasing all operations after i58, plus its Overwatch team disbanded before that.
Velox on the other hand faced roster issues on two teams, and is no longer in the UK Overwatch scene. This makes more room for teams in the eighth place tie to grab themselves a group stage slot.
To deal with this tie issue, ESL is hosting a series just for the tied teams next week. This will determine the group going into the first ESL UK Overwatch season. You can check back next Tuesday to see the confirmed group stage teams that will be participating for their chance to get to MCM Comic Con in October – and crown themselves the best team in the UK!
Overall, the UK Contender Cups have been a good run for such a young scene. With decent funding into prize pools, committed players returning or looking to get back into the scene, we should expect the scene to only get bigger and better.
Many teams in here have no real org backing, so in the near future, we should expect that to change for the best.
