Marta J. August 8, 2019
Team Romania has decided to drop out of the 2019 Overwatch World Cup due to lack of funding and, the team claims, the lack of Blizzard’s support.
The coach of Romania’s Overwatch team, Raureanu “ElDonte” Andrei, shared an official statement in a TwitLonger post, letting followers know that Team Romania won’t be attending BlizzCon as the team doesn’t have the money to cover necessary costs, and Blizzard has done nothing to help in this regard.
“Due to lack of sponsors and lack of interest from Blizzard to actually do something right for once instead of cutting costs everywhere to fuel their subpar viewer count league, Team Romania will not be coming to BlizzCon this year to participate as we do not have the money for it,” ElDonte said.
ElDonte went on to criticize various rules and restrictions implemented by Blizzard for this year’s competition.
Team Romania isn’t one of the top ten seeds for 2019 OWWC, but has rather been voted on by the fans to participate. Blizzard has made clear that they offer full support only for the top ten countries, including airfare, ground transportation, and hotel accommodation. Other teams need to fund everything but the accommodations themselves.
The news of the team dropping out of OWWC was later confirmed over Team Romania’s official Twitter account. Their social media team often jokes about Romania’s weak economic situation. Even when announcing their OWWC roster, Team Romania posted a paint-made graphic saying they lack funding for a proper one, and that it had been made by ElDonte for free. The team also had an ongoing joke with fans that they’re focusing all of their money into building a raft that will hopefully take them to BlizzCon.
The Overwatch World Cup will be played at BlizzCon starting November 1 and will last two days. The Romanian team initially planned on attending with a seven-man roster, including Robert “Skairipa” Lupsa, “eDD”, “Androbion”, “Slade, “Alexio, “RTT”, and “Tsema”. Now, they won’t be attending at all.