This weekend in London, England, 16 of the top Call of Duty teams from America and Europe will fight for $100,000 at the GFinity Summer Championship. The winner of this tournament will take home half of the total prize pool, winning $50,000.Second will get $25,000, third will get $10,000, fourth will get $5,000, fifth will get $2,500. The remaining teams will go home with nothing but memories.
GFinity was very particular in who they allowed to compete in this tournament. They picked the top 4 teams in North American Pro Points among players of 18 years old. Those teams being OpTic Gaming, FaZe, eLevate,and OpTic Nation. They then chose the top 4 teams from the GFinity European Pro league. Those teams being Vitality.Storm, Epsilon.EU, Hyper, and VwS (who were given their spot from Gamers2 withdrawing from the tournament.) They then invited eight more teams as long as every player on the roster was older than 18. Four teams from America, four teams from Europe. The American teams being Rise Nation, TCM, Team Kaliber, and EnVyUs. The European teams are Spirit, IGI, Infused, and Liquid.
The tournament will begin in pool play. The way it will work is a double elimination bracket inside the pools. The best way to describe it is to win twice before you lose twice. So without futher adieu, lets get into the pools.
Group A: The returning Champs from the Spring Masters are the top headline in this pool. After coming second at UMG Dallas, OpTic Gaming looks to get back to their winning ways.Their first match this weekend will be against VwS. The roster of Jake, Realize, Braaain, and Nolson will have their hands full right off the bat in what is already the biggest tournament they've ever competed in. The other early macthup in this pool is EnVyUs going against Hyper. EnVy are coming off a 6th place finish at Dallas. This time, they're looking to get in the money. Hyper will give them a run for their money though. After a third place finish in the GFinity Pro League, they have rightfully earned their spot in this tournament and will look to show why.
Group B: The champs are here! UMG Dallas champions FaZe will look to get back to business this weekend. They'll first match up against the Liquid, the squad that comes from Italy. You can basically say this one is over, 3-0 for FaZe. Sadly for the Italians, they are way out of the league FaZe is in. The other match in this group is Team kaliber - Infused. This match may get interesting. tK hasn't looked great in a long time and may be a little overconfident. Infused will look to rally behind the crowd, with arguably the most popular European player, MarkyB on their side. This is a match that very well could go the distance to game 5. If Team Kaliber aren't prepared for the European style attacks, this could be a win for the one of England's favorite teams.
Group C: Having to use two fill-in's do to travel issues and the age limit, eLevate come in with Slacked and Classic, and are using Slasher and Replays from Denial. They'll get into the action first thing against IGI. This is an English team full of mysteries with a roster of Sowerz, Vapez, Liiim, and Camboo. They may have what it takes to steal a series from an under-practiced eLevate squad that was thrown together for this event. The other match in this pool will also lead off the day with Rise Nation - Epsilon.EU. Epsilon finished second in the GFinity Pro League but knocked off the winners of the League early on. They should be well capable of handling this Rise squad. But Rise will definitely fight back. They'll be led by Apathy and will feed off of hype from Burnsoff. This match has Game 5 calling for it.
Group D: This group will round out the day. This is what many consider to be the Group of Death. OpTic Nation will start off against Spirit. Although Spirit may be the weakest team in this pool, they have the advantage that no one knows what they bring to the table. After a very unstable Top 20 finish at Dallas, OpTic Nation may be vulnerable. To round out pool play, the top team from the GFinity Pro League will go against the half American-half English TCM squad. While there may be reason to believe that this can be a close series, Vitality was playing hot in the Pro League, and TCM is said to be losing composure.
Predictions: Group A will see OpTic Gaming and EnVyUs get out. Group B will be FaZe and Team Kaliber. Group C will be Rise Nation and Epsilon.EU. Group D will have Vitality.Storm and TCM. For those keeping at home, that's six American teams breaking through to the bracket, and two European teams.