This year’s Thunder Esports Tour is a great opportunity for the Philippine CS:GO scene.
Thunder Esports Tour marked the first time that Mineski has conducted a major CS:GO event this 2019. Featuring four qualifiers (Pampanga in Luzon, Metron Manila, Cebu in Visayas and Cagayan de Oro in Mindanao), the tournament provides an avenue for CS:GO teams from all over the country to display their talents.
Here is a quick overview of the teams:
Fallen 5
They are actually members of the former Bren Esports roster who won the Killshot CS:GO tournament in 2018 and the Breach PH CS:GO tournament in May 2019. As such, they actually have a good record when it comes to recent events.
This team is looking forward to heat up the tournament once again – after all, this squad contains a lot of talent.
Whether they can overcome the household names in the form of Bren Esports and Station-751 is a question that would be best answered this weekend.
Bren Esports
Four of the five members of this team belonged to the TNC squad that won second place at the World Electronic Sports Games (WESG) SEA Finals back in 2018, as well as the squad that broke to the octofinal (round of 16) of the WESG Global Finals.
In addition, they are the current national title holders by virtue of winning the Plus Attack title, as well as the last edition of the Tarlac Esports League. As a result, there’s no doubt that they would come into this tournament as one of, if not the clear favorites for this event.
Station-751
It seems that Cebu’s finest has a chance to get to another tournament again and make their name there as they win the Visayas qualifier. It is interesting to note that they have never placed outside of the top 3 in the WASD TESL and the Plus Attack tournament, though they did not make it in various other competitions.
Regardless, their talent and strength should be able to win against most teams on this list – and even make their matches against Bren Esports interesting on a good day.
Metronoia
Mindanao’s finest. Zamboanga’s own. All proud warriors.
Underdogs of the national scene.
The representation of a scene that used to be nothing but a footnote in Philippine CS:GO. Who would have thought that Zamboanga City would become home to such a team – in a scene that used to be riddled with numerous problems.
They’ve won nearly everything in Mindanao within the past few years. They’ve got the chance to see a national final this year, losing to Fallen 5 in the process. They’ve even got to the quarterfinals of an online Asian tournament twice, seeing action against some of SEA’s big teams.
Whatever happens here, this team has nothing to lose…and everything to gain.
