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Australia qualifies for Overwatch World Cup; gets drawn in 'group of death'

The Overwatch World Cup is back! (Image: Blizzard Entertainment)
Editor
2nd May, 2018
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Australia have punched their ticket to the Overwatch World Cup for the third straight year, but will face a monumental task in moving out of the group stage after being drawn to play several powerhouses in the group stage.

The 2018 edition of the World Cup was announced in late March, with the national qualification process taking place immediately after the announcement.

The top 20 countries – based on the average skill rating (SR) of their top 150 ranked players – qualified for the tournament alongside the automatically included group stage hosts in France, South Korea, Thailand and the USA.

With an average SR of 4111, Australia qualified for the cup as the No. 13 ranked qualifier (No. 16 when the host nations are included) – but hopes they can reproduce their fairytale run to BlizzCon last year took a serious hit with the unveiling of their group stage opponents.

The Aussies have been pitted against China and Sweden – the tournament’s top two non-host countries – as well as Denmark (No. 8) in a nightmare Group C.

The rest of the six-team group isn’t as scary, with Spain (No. 17) and bottom-ranked hosts Thailand sure to provide Australia with some respite, but with a top-two finish required to progress to BlizzCon, the green and gold will need to pull off some serious upsets.

The exact dates and times for Group Stage matches are still to be confirmed, but it looks as if the Thailand qualifier will be the third of the four.

The South Korea group will see the two-time reigning champion hosts face off against 2016 runners-up Russia, as well as Japan, Finland, Chinese Taipei and Hong Kong.

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The USA group will see the hosts take on local rivals and 2017 runners-up Canada, alongside Brazil, Austria, Switzerland and Norway.

The fourth and final group figures to be an all-European affair, with hosts France tackling the UK, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Poland.

With the conclusion of the qualification phase, the selection of each country’s National Competition Committee has begun.

Blizzard themselves will select each nation’s general manager, while each country’s top 150 ranked players will vote on a coach. The wider community will also have a chance to have their say on who should be the community lead.

The top three coaching candidates and top ten community lead candidates for each country will be revealed on May 17.

Australia’s run in last year’s World Cup was a sight to behold.

After making light work of Portugal and Italy, they were forced to settle for second place in their group after a loss to Sweden, before going on to be the only non-group winner to triumph in the Round of 16 after a thrilling upset of Japan.

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At BlizzCon in November, the Aussies were valiant in their quarter-final with Canada, but eventually lost a 2-0 lead in their best-of-five to succumb to the eventual runners-up 3-2.

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