Cloud9 gets ESWC invite after failed qualification bid

One of North America’s best Counter-Strike teams failed to qualify for a major tournament last week—but that’s not stopping them from taking part.

The Micro-Star International Electronic Sports World Cup (ESWC) has invited Cloud9 to compete in the event alongside Team Liquid and some of the best teams in the world at Counter-Strike: Global Offensive.

Liquid bested Cloud9 in the North American qualifier for the tournament. But there was more to the match than the boxscore. On May 31, rifleman Ryan “fREAKAZOiD” Abadir suffered Internet connection issues—the result of an apparent direct denial-of-service (DDOS) attack. As a result, Cloud9 lost one of its best players for the matches, and couldn’t keep up with Liquid.

ESWC will be the team’s second international event with their new roster—and they’ll be hoping for better results this time around. In the group stages of Gfinity Spring Masters II on last month, the team only managed a win over Immunity. It fell to Virtus.Pro, a team who it will most likely face at the ESWC, in a 0-2 loss.

The team recently bested Liquid in a HTC: Reborn, a domestic tournament on June 7 thanks to an impressive performance from rifleman Abadir and AWPer Tyler “Skadoodle” Latham. This was their first domestic tournament win since their roster shakeup, though it has held on to first place ESEA and ESL Pro League and boasted some impressive results in FACEIT’s North American League.

At ESWC, the team won’t need to worry about DDoS attacks knocking out one of its best players. They’ll need all the help they can get against strong competition, including Polish teams Virtus.Pro and Gamers2, Germany’s Penta eSports, Spanish x6tence, Keyd Stars of Brazil, and Australian Voxeminor.

Photo via Gfinity UK/Flickr | Remix by Jacob Wolf