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China Super Major invites sparks controversy

Vignesh RaghuramPublished On: 
China Super Major has announced the ten direct invites to the biggest and last Dota Pro Circuit event of the season. Among the expected names such as Virtus.pro and Team Liquid, the invites of EG, Na'Vi and OG while leaving out LGD Gaming, Fnatic and OpTic Gaming have sparked controversy and outrage from the pros.

       
Translation: SuperMajor invite is cool and all, but why not invite directly to the finals??

OG’s direct invite, in particular, has caused so much controversy because the team is ineligible for a TI8 direct invite after their roster change (removal of Resolut1on). OG can’t benefit from the points they might earn at Minors and Majors and they are not even eligible for an invite to the closed regional qualifiers for TI8.

This criticism has lead to PGL defending their invites to the Super Major on twitter. They say that the invites were handed to the teams in mid-March. However, they didn’t disclose the exact date of when those invitational emails were sent through.

 
But both Wykrhm Reddy and Mineski’s General Manager Yamyam Villanueva Yui, confirmed that the invites were sent out on 19th March 2018. Adding to this is EG’s COO, Philip Aram who confirmed that their invite came right after the GESC Indonesia Minor, which they won on the 18th March 2018

     
 
EternaLEnVy’s comments on the SEA region being completely ignored
 
EternaLEnVy was very vocal on the topic of SEA being at a huge disadvantage this season. He said that most DPC tournaments had just one slot for SEA, whereas other regions benefitted from tournaments handing out more slots to other teams.
 
With Mineski winning DAC in Shanghai, SEA finally got their highlight moment of the season, which should have lead to more invites for the following tournaments. But unfortunately, all tournaments have just given more slots to other regions.

He added that both Na’Vi and OG’s invites to the China Supermajor was a big “fuck you to competitive integrity and especially SEA”.

 
What's interesting at this point is that Na'Vi is just 249 points ahead of Fnatic in the rankings (The majority of which comes from LiL’s points from Virtus Pro). With both teams close to reaching the top 8 for TI8 direct invites, an invite to the Major could be the defining moment of the season for both teams.
 

The last stop before TI8 on the 2017-2018 Pro Circuit season will be held in Shanghai, China in early June worth $1,500,000 and 2,250 DPC points. A total of 16 teams will compete at the event, ten invited directly and six qualified teams —one from each of the designated regions. A win for a team here will most likely guarantee an invite to The International 8.