A glance at Team Finland of 2016 would reveal that aside from an overabundance of DPS talent consolidated in one place, the team featured another common trait: Pyjamas strewn everywhere. With ex-Ninjas in Pyjamas players zappis, mafu, and hymzi, alongside stars such as Taimou, LiNkzr, and Tseini, the nation looked to have a top placing at the first Overwatch World Cup. Despite fielding such a talented roster, they fell at the hands of their Nordic brothers in Team Sweden for a disappointing fourth-place finish.

This year, they aim higher.

Given the new committee system that Blizzard chose to implement in 2017, Team Finland enters the World Cup with a far more balanced roster. Rather than stacking four DPS players, a tank, and a flex together as they were voted last year, the council chose five Rest in Pyjamas members in zappis, LiNkzr, fragi, kyynel, and Zuppehw, and closed out the roster with a player considered to be in the discussion for most talented in the world: Taimou.

In keeping with the trend of bringing along entire professional teams, Team Finland hopes that the synergy they pack from practice on Rest in Pyjamas will carry over to grant them a chance in the World Cup. However, according to councilmember zappis, the synergy is simply a byproduct of stacking talent. "The goal was to make a flexible roster with powerful flex and DPS players. The core synergy really comes from the roots of RiP, but when we made the World Cup team LiNkzr wasn't even playing with us—that came after for Contenders," he noted. "I also believe individually each role has really strong players as well."

The old Ninjas in Pyjamas team was famous during their sponsored days for strong coordination and incredible tank play, but unfortunately, their most cited trait was their inexplicable inability to perform in a LAN environment. Despite strong showings in online play throughout late 2016, Ninjas in Pyjamas found themselves knocked out relatively early at the Overwatch Open and at DreamHack Winter—the latter being a tournament that they entered as the favorites by a large margin.

zappis, however, notes that their lack of LAN success in the past is not a topic that should breed worry: "Unfortunately we quite couldn't transfer [our great play during the tank meta] into LAN results and our weaknesses during 2017 got the better of us. Thus, RiP was born. I don't see NiP's fall affecting us negatively, I think it just made us stronger."

The final member of the team, Taimou is one of the most decorated LAN performers in the world, with victories during APEX's inaugural season and MLG Vegas. His experiences in performing in foreign countries is nothing to shirk off, as the team will play in Group D of the Sydney Qualifier. They enter the event as group favorites, with Team Spain looking to provide the best level of competition against them. However, the real story is rival Team Sweden in Group C—should either team fall to an upset during the group, a potential matchup might occur post-group stage, leading to a knockout match before either even gets to Anaheim.

Team Finland stands six-strong:

  • Timo "Taimou" Kettunen (DPS)
  • Joonas "zappis" Alakurtti (Flex)
  • Jiri "LiNkzr" Masalin (Flex)
  • Joona "fragi" Laine (Tank)
  • Anti "kyynel" Kinnunen (Support)
  • Aleksi "Zuppehw Kuntsi (Support)

Matches against Team Spain, Team Japan, and Team Vietnam kick off in Sydney on July 21.