The last chance saloon opened its doors early, welcoming those who had fallen in the first Contenders qualifier. The second day of the qualifiers offered another opportunity for top European teams to compete for $50,000 and, perhaps more importantly, guaranteed their involvement in competition for the coming months.

The first Contenders qualifier saw eUnited blaze to victory, followed by Misfits, Movistar Riders, TS Ninjas, Vivi’s Adventure, Bazooka Puppiez, 123, and Laser Kittenz. With their places locked in at seeds one through eight, they were safe to simply watch as hundreds of their competitors strived to join them in Contenders Season Zero groups.

Eight teams received preferential seeding going into day two due to their placement in the first day: Cyclowns, NWA, GamersOrigin, Team expert, NiP, ZenGaming, CoolCatClan, and Bounty Hunters were placed in separate arms of the bracket. It worked well for the first five, with the latter three lesser-known teams falling by the wayside.

Final standings

The top teams from today will go into Contenders Season Zero groups from seeds nine to sixteen. The final standings from the second day of qualifiers was:

To remind you of the overall seeds, here are the other teams seeded above them who qualified yesterday:

Road to the final

Cyclown were denied entry to Contenders yesterday after losing 1-2 to eUnited in the round of 16, limited to seed nine despite their strong performance against the top European side. Cyclown's journey today to the final began a little shakily with their new roster.

The former European powerhouse had been enduring tough times after losing Boombox and Mowzassa, replacing them with Epzz and Lateks for this qualifier. Cyclowns, running their classic triple DPS dive, had two close games offstream against The Korean Slayer + 5 and BX3 where they lost maps, but the team managed to hold on to qualify.

Once confirmed into Contenders, with the pressure relieved slightly, Cyclowns blasted through the bracket without dropping a map. They overcame the up-and-coming Team expert after locking them out on Gibraltar and then slamming the attack home, following it up with a clean sweep on Lijiang. There was definite resistance from Team expert, who had played solidly up to that point, but they were outmatched in the triple DPS mirror match-up.

Moving to the finals, Cyclowns met an unexpected opponent in GamersOrigin. They appeared to be caught on the back foot a little in their opening defense of Gibraltar, losing their hold with around three minutes left on the French stopclock. Cyclowns proved the efficiency of the triple DPS dive on Gibraltar by replying with a lightning fast response, completing the map with five minutes remaining.

They went on to outperform GamersOrigin in the overtime, again more strongly on offense, and followed that momentum into Nepal. On Nepal both teams opted for triple DPS in the majority of their fights, but Cyclowns showed remarkable synergy and consistency given their roster’s youth.

GamersOrigin brought the fight to a potential tier-one team and performed admirably in the final. Their new recruits of zYKK and DixxyDix added a little more punch to their attacks, evolving the team from languishing tank fanatics to a developing dive aficionados. Their run saw them beat IceBlockGG, Ninjas in Pyjamas, and NWA in their run to the finals - outperforming expectations in three close games.

Their first clash in the qualifier was a French civil war. The star-studded roster of IceBlockGG stood before them, and in a close offstream battle GamersOrigin melted them 2-1. In the quarterfinals they faced NiP and had an insanely close game running again to three maps. Ninjas were playing with LiNkzr over Mafu and had transitioned to full triple DPS dive, a complete new look for their team, and got the better of Route 66. GO replied with extremely close games on Lijiang and Hanamura, both teams playing sloppily but with their hearts on their sleeves.

Their win over NWA in the semifinals looked close on paper and again both teams ran triple DPS. The new Ninjas with Attitude roster was very much still gelling together however and crumbled with their synergy, as individual players also failed to make stand-out performances. GamersOrigin became the Ninja-slayers and moved on to the final, securing themselves the second seed.

The rest of the pack

NWA played Alfa Squad in the quarterfinals, in a battle of up-and-coming teams. Alfa Squad placed well in a number of smaller tournaments leading in, combining Finnish talent into a coherent system. The battle was incredibly close, going to a draw on Anubis which required a tiebreaker bo3 on Oasis to solve. Alfa Squad came out the loser but will look to take upset scalps in Contenders groups.

Alfa Squad had to overcome ZenGaming, formerly x4ckers, to make Contenders. The Israeli squad performed to their seeding from the day before, beating Seqta to reach the round of 16, with any of the three realistically with a good chance at making it.

Two teams that were lucky to avoid squads of that calibre on their run were ESPORATI and Team eSporters Cyberathletes. The latter had a fantastic (in terms of comedy value) match-up in the ro16 against Team Fidgeting Spineteers, with the winner getting into Contenders. Both avoided any serious contenders in their arm of the bracket as they were seeded in with Bounty Hunters, an unknown team from the day before. To be fair however, TeC has made some decent appearances with their majority Spanish roster in small tournaments before and took a map from Team expert, so this is clearly not a side to be taken too lightly.

To explain how ESPORATI ended up in the quarterfinals, one has to see the arm they were in. With CoolCatClan and Bounty Hunters receiving seeds beyond their ability, it placed LDLC in an easier arm with opponents they should have, on paper, been able to handle. The French roster made it to the round of 16 before meeting ESPORATI, a team that had reasonable results in Go4 weeklies. They stumbled with the finish line in site, allowing another lesser-known team into Contenders. All eyes will be on ESPORATI to see if they can perform above their stature.

As an interesting aside, IceBlockGG and UB Team both hit reasonably strong teams on both days. The French side hit Riders and then GamersOrigin, losing both times before the quarterfinals, while UB Team met Laser Kittenz on the first day and then immediately faced Alfa Squad on the second. They join the likes of Seqta, Copenhagen Flames, Helsinki REDS, and the rest now outside the Contenders window looking in.

The group stage for Contenders begins on the 17th June, and you can find details on our event page here.