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The 2018 edition of the Overwatch World Cup started late last month in Incheon, South Korea – and now we turn our attention to Los Angeles and Group B.
There will be plenty of heavyweights on show at the Blizzard Arena, with last year’s runners-up Canada looking to upstage the hometown favourites in the USA.
They’ll be joined by some plucky European sides in Norway and Austria, who’ll both fancy their chances of causing a famous upset.
Incheon played host to Group A’s matches in late August, and it was Finland who punched their ticket to BlizzCon alongside perennial contenders South Korea.
With just two spots on the line and six teams competing for them, we’re sure to be in for a treat.
Let’s have a look at how Group B will shape up.
| Country | SR | Rank* |
| USA | 4429 | 3/Host |
| Austria | 4068 | 17 |
| Brazil | 4010 | 23 |
| Canada | 4269 | 7 |
| Norway | 4122 | 14 |
| Switzerland | 4011 | 22 |
* – As the four group stage host countries automatically qualified, the official rankings only include the non-hosts and run from 1-20. These rankings include the host countries.
All dates and times AEST
Day 1 – Saturday September 8 |
|
|---|---|
| Teams | Time |
| Austria vs Canada | 3:00 AM |
| Norway vs Switzerland | 4:45 AM |
| Canada vs Brazil | 6:30 AM |
| Austria vs USA | 8:15 AM |
| Norway vs Brazil | 10:00 AM |
Day 2 – Sunday September 9 |
|
| Teams | Time |
| Switzerland vs Austria | 3:00 AM |
| Brazil vs USA | 4:45 AM |
| Norway vs Canada | 6:30 AM |
| USA vs Switzerland | 8:15 AM |
| Brazil vs Austria | 10:00 AM |
Day 3 – Monday September 10 |
|
| Teams | Time |
| Norway vs Austria | 3:00 AM |
| Canada vs Switzerland | 4:45 AM |
| Norway vs USA | 6:30 AM |
| Switzerland vs Brazil | 8:15 AM |
| USA vs Canada | 10:00 AM |
The organisers have saved the best match until last and, for us Australians, it’s on at the very friendly time of 10am. The match I’m referring to is, of course, the huge grudge match between the USA and Canada to close out day three.
With neither side likely to have dropped a match until that point, this will likely decide who finishes with the coveted first seed and scores an easier quarterfinal.
If one team has dropped a game, however, it could give the other side the opportunity to knock them out altogether…
The unfriendly timezone makes it hard to label many other matches as ‘must-watch’, although the first match of day three – Norway vs Austria – pits the two sides most likely to steal a spot, if the North American teams stumble, against one another.
Of all four Overwatch World Cup groups, this one looks to the easiest to pick the two BlizzCon qualifiers from.
With rosters made up largely of Overwatch League stars – not to mention their revered pedigree at this level – those quarterfinal tickets look like the USA and Canada’s to lose.
All of the USA’s players played in the league last season, with the exception of underage Academy player ZachaREEE (Zachary Lombardo). Canada have four top flight players of their own – five if you count controversial free agent xqc (Felix Lengyel).
Adding spice to this rivalry is the fact that the American coach Aero (Aaron Atkins) and Canadian coach Jayne (Justin Conroy) are head coach and assistant, respectively, at the Dallas Fuel.
While no match is a gimme at this level, it’s hard to see any of the other countries coming close.
As the two lowest-ranked countries at the world cup (excluding Group C hosts Thailand), it looks like Switzerland and Brazil could be in for a tough time.
Brazil didn’t qualify for the first world cup and were only able to take maps off New Zealand in a brutal 2017 appearance that saw them shredded by the USA and Taiwan.
Switzerland, on the other hand, weren’t sighted at last year’s tournament but did compete in the massive 30-team European qualifier in 2016 – finishing 29th.
Like Group A, we won’t likely see any great surprises as to who finishes in the top two but, once again, I’m confident we’ll see a very different ladder to what the pre-tournament rankings suggest.
My bold call, however, is that Canada will dethrone the home team in the final match of the stage and head to BlizzCon as the unlikely Group B champions.
While it’s true the USA have more Overwatch League players on their list, the names on the Canadian side are arguably more impressive.
Gladiators superstar Surefour (Lane Roberts), Valiant DPS maestro Agilities (Brady Girardi), Boston’s premier tank NotE (Lucas Meissner) and Houston support Bani (Chris Benell) spearhead a very impressive-looking team, while the contributions of the exiled xqc and 2017 cup hero Mangachu (Liam Campbell) won’t be small.
Do they stack up favourably against a USA team made up mainly of players from San Francisco and the Outlaws? I think so.
At the bottom of the ladder – Norway look to be a cut above their fellow also-rans, and I think they’ll not only comfortably third, but will be good enough to take at least one map off one of the North American powerhouses.
I think the other three non-finalists, however, will all take wins off each other and all finish 1-4. Austria are ranked higher than Switzerland and Brazil, but their roster has a worrying number of players who don’t have clubs to play for right now.
They may not have past success to be inspired by, but the Swiss and Brazilians have rosters who’ve spent much of this year playing at the same clubs. One of them will be good enough to surprise the Austrians.
1st – Canada (5-0)
2nd – USA (4-1)
3rd – Norway (3-2)
4th – Brazil (1-4)
5th – Austria (1-4)
6th – Switzerland (1-4)