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Three of this year’s group stages are done, and there’s just one more to go as the Overwatch World Cup looks ahead to the knockout stage. Six teams will play off in Paris, with only two allowed to progress to BlizzCon 2018.
Australia stunned the world by qualifying from Group C, along with China. Those sides join South Korea, Finland, the USA and Canada as six of the eight quarter-finalists.
The six European countries looking to nab one of the final two tickets are; France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, and the UK.
There might not be as many big name players this time around, but the intense rivalries between all six team in this group will make the tournament thrilling viewing.
Let’s have a look at how Group D will shape up.
| Country | SR | Rank* |
| France | 4286 | 5/Host |
| Germany | 4238 | 10 |
| Italy | 4116 | 15 |
| Netherlands | 4200 | 12 |
| Poland | 4038 | 20 |
| United Kingdom | 4293 | 4 |
* – 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 – Friday September 21 |
|
|---|---|
| Teams | Time |
| Netherlands vs France | 6:00 PM |
| Germany vs United Kingdom | 7:45 PM |
| Poland vs Italy | 9:30 PM |
| Netherlands vs Germany | 11:15 PM |
Day 2 – Saturday September 22 |
|
| Teams | Time |
| Poland vs United Kingdom | 1:00 AM |
| Germany vs France | 8:00 PM |
| Italy vs Netherlands | 9:45 PM |
| Poland vs Germany | 11:30 PM |
Day 3 – Sunday September 23 |
|
| Teams | Time |
| Italy vs France | 1:15 AM |
| Netherlands vs United Kingdom | 3:00 AM |
| Italy vs Germany | 8:00 PM |
| Poland vs France | 9:45 PM |
| Italy vs United Kingdom | 11:30 PM |
Day 4 – Monday September 24 |
|
| Teams | Time |
| Poland vs Netherlands | 1:15 AM |
| United Kingdom vs France | 3:00 AM |
Timezones make this one of the hardest groups for Australian fans to watch live, especially seeing as a lot of the juicier matchups look to be scheduled for later in the day (or very early morning for us).
The first two matches on day one – France versus the Netherlands and Germany versus the UK – are on at a good time and should give us a good idea early on as to whether there’s much separating the contenders from the rest in this group.
From there on, it’s really just a case of which rivalry appeals to you the most.
Germany versus France (8pm Saturday), Italy versus France (1:15am Sunday), Italy versus Germany (8pm Sunday) and the UK versus France (3am Monday) should all have a fair bit of spice to them and, if you can navigate the occasional late night, will be rewarding viewing.
If Group C was the group of death then, no disrespect to the competitors, this is the group of life.
We’ve seen some surprises already, but if France don’t make it out of this group on top – or at least in the top two – they’ll be talking about it on Neptune.
Their Overwatch League-heavy roster includes the LA Valiant’s SoOn (Terence Tarlier), Dallas duo aKm (Dylan Bignet) and uNKOE (Benjamin Chevasson), as well as Poko (Gael Gouzerch) of Philadelphia. They are also coached by Valiant assistant daemoN (Julien Ducros).
No other team comes remotely close to the French in terms of talent, although the UK deserve favouritism for second given they boast the only other league player in Boombox (Isaac Charles), as well as having Fusion assistant Hayes (Elliot Hayes) as their coach.
Coming into Group C, we were all worried about the horrors Thai fans might be subjected to but, pleasantly, were surprised to see the hosts take it right up to everyone they played and come away with an encouraging win.
I hope we’re surprised, but there appears to be little hope for Poland coming into Group D. While they have professional experience, not a single member of their roster is currently on a professional team. Danye (Karol Szcześniak) appears to be the most prominent of the bunch, having appeared for the Copenhagen Flames in European Contenders.
That said, the overall depth in Group D appears to be quite thin. It’s hard to see the Netherlands, Germany or Italy challenging France or the UK – despite how close the rankings make them seem.
Things never go completely to script in these events, but it really is difficult to see anything but a top two of France and the UK coming out of this one.
I’ve written myself into a corner somewhat by promising big surprise predictions for every group so, throwing it out there a bit, I’m going to back France to not drop a single map all weekend and roar to BlizzCon with a 5-0 record and a 20-0 map differential.
I don’t think Poland will suffer the same unfortunate fate as Hong Kong in Group A – who went 0-5 and 0-20 overall – but I do think they’ll drop all their matches comfortably and finish with the second-worst overall record.
The UK should be far too good for the rest of the contenders, but should hit a brick wall against France, and finish in second place.
As far as the other three countries go, I’m backing them to split their matches against one another.
1st – France (5-0)
2nd – United Kingdom (4-1)
3rd – Netherlands (2-3)
4th – Germany (2-3)
5th – Italy (2-3)
6th – Poland (0-5)