The ESL Atlantic Showdown Regional Finals have came to an end and from the 32 teams, we now have the top 8 teams that will make it to the main event at Gamescom.
16 teams of the North America and Europe regions competed for the four slots to reach the main event in a double elimination format. Two teams from the winner’s bracket and another two from the loser’s bracket will advance.
Over on the NA side, the top dog Overwatch team in the world, EnVyUs, breezed through the brackets, taking a sweeping 3-0 in all the matches against Deli, Method and TSM. The previous Luminosity team, now under the NRG banner, was struggling hard, with a 3-1 win against Splyce but lost 3-0 to the ever-stronger Fnatic. NRG’s run in the lower brackets was also showing signs that the No.3 team in NA is struggling after winning against Northen Gaming Red, a team that is also facing some internal problems, and then lost to the rising Team Liquid. Both Team Liquid and suprisingly ohno, had a good run in the loser’s brackets, winning two matches to reach the last match where the winner gets the ticket to Gamescom, which unfortunately did not go to both of them.
Cloud 9, the second strongest team in NA, arguably the strongest team consisting of all NA players (EnVy is mostly European, though they are now based in NA) almost saw a crack in their match against Fnatic. The bout ran on four the full 5 game with Fnatic playing strongly, securing the first two games. However, Cloud 9 made some great counter-picks, bringing back Pharah and Mercy in some matches, the two heroes that used to dominate the meta until the current patch, to throw off Fnatic a bit. The whole match is all about counter-picking and adapting new startegies on the fly, especially on The Temple Of Anubis.
With EnvyUs and Cloud 9 secured, the other two teams that got knocked down to losers, TSM and Fnatic, faced Liquid and ohno respectively. TSM went 3-1 against Liquid while Fnatic took down ohno 3-0.
EnVyUs, Cloud 9, TSM and Fnatic will be the four teams from NA to go to the Grand Finals.
Over to Europe, the top teams are not as definitive as the NA side. Misfits, Rouge and REUNITED are arguably the top teams, but results of their matchups are pretty much even where any team could win or lose. And with the rise of ANOX, the newly signed Ninjas in Pajamas (previously SG-1) and the new Luminosity Gaming team (previously 2sTroNk), there’s plenty of competition in Europe.
Misfits were the first to qualify, but it’s no steamroll. After sending Team Aera to the losers, they faced Luminosity and won 3-1, and a long bout against Rouge. Rouge were in the lead with 2-0 but Misfits adapated and made a comeback to win by 3-2, sending Rouge to the losers. REUNITED also had a strong run. Unlike the other similarly named team WEUNITED that got knocked out early by Ninjas in Pajamas and then lost to ANOX, REUNITED went on to secure the second spot in the winners bracket by winning against b.fly, Melty and Creation, only dropping one game against Melty.
Over to the losers, ANOX and Ninjas in Pajamas had a strong run down there after being knocked out by Rouge and Creation respectively. ANOX went on a roll, taking out WEUNITED, Luminosity but lost to Creation in the last match. Ninjas in Pajamas took down OWKings, and Melty to eventually lose to Rouge.
Misfits, REUNITED, Rouge and Creation will be the European teams to reach the Grand Finals.
The 8 remaining teams will be gunning for a piece of the $100,000 prize pool and will be competing in a LAN setup at Gamescom, held at Berlin on August 20-21st. May the best team wins, and hopefully there’s a team that can take down EnVyUs.