Sligo Rovers defeated Shamrock Rovers 2-0 in a best-of-three final at Three Ireland’s EStars tournament on the weekend.
The League of Legends tournament – EStars, which was announced in late 2017 – saw teams representing Irish football teams.
Sligo Rovers won the €20,000 top prize and a trip to Las Vegas.
It took place at Dublin’s 3Arena and organisers told Esports News UK that some 3,000 tickets were sold.
Guest streamers and YouTubers at the event included RossBoomSocks, Yogscast Turps, Yogscast Sjin, Gross Gore and Rezone.
Sligo’s roster consisted of Darren Hopkins, Kevin Treanor, Robert Cooney, Viktor Kudrickij and Johny Cummins.
Treanor told Joe.ie: “The entire experience was so surreal, from playing on stage in front of thousands of people to the prize itself. That being said, we only got as far as we did through incredible amounts of dedication from the team.
“I’m incredibly proud of how far we’ve come along as team as we’ve grown so much.”
There was also performances from football freestylers F2 Freestylers, as well as arguably the stars of the show: Irish dance group Prodijig.
“We were delighted to have been involved with Ireland’s biggest esports tournament which was a truly unique experience.”
Karl Donnelly, Three Ireland
Mags Byrne of Three Ireland’s EStars said: “Congratulations to Sligo Rovers and their players on been crowned the champions of the first ever Three Ireland’s EStars. The scale of this spectacular final and the unbelievable extravaganza that surrounded the exciting finale was a true celebration and a testament to the exponential growth of esports in Ireland.”
Karl Donnelly, head of sponsorship at Three Ireland, added: “We were delighted to have been involved with Ireland’s biggest esports tournament which was a truly unique experience.
“On behalf of Three, we would like to congratulate Sligo Rovers and we wish them well in Las Vegas. Our own team, Team Three, a team of our customers who registered through our loyalty programme 3plus, were unlucky not to make the finals but the interest that was shown was incredible.”
‘Game’s done lads, time for a jig’
No true Irish entertainment event would of course go without some Irish dancing. And that’s exactly what EStars had (see 2:56 above).
At the the end of the matches and the interviews, Irish dance group Prodijig took to the stage to treat viewers to some traditional-yet-modern Irish dancing.
The live Twitch chat reacted with excitement and interest. Maybe that’s what UK and Ireland League of Legends has been missing all these years? We look forward to more Irish dancing at the Forge of Champions, then, Rito.
Image source: EStars Twitter/INPHO/Bryan Keane
Dom is an award-winning writer and finalist of the Esports Journalist of the Year 2023 award. He graduated from Bournemouth University with a 2:1 degree in Multi-Media Journalism in 2007.
As a long-time gamer having first picked up the NES controller in the late ’80s, he has written for a range of publications including GamesTM, Nintendo Official Magazine, industry publication MCV and others. He worked as head of content for the British Esports Federation up until February 2021, when he stepped back to work full-time on Esports News UK and offer esports consultancy and freelance services. Note: Dom still produces the British Esports newsletter on a freelance basis, so our coverage of British Esports is always kept simple – usually just covering the occasional press release – because of this conflict of interest.
