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Overwatch League season start delayed due to Covid-19 resurgence
The Overwatch League has announced that the start of the 2022 season in the Eastern region has been delayed by two weeks due to “the ongoing coronavirus outbreak in China,” which will begin on May 20.
The change will affect Chinese teams Chengdu Hunters, Guangzhou Charge, Hangzhou Chargers and Shanghai Dragons, as well as American teams Los Angeles Valiant, New York Excelsior and Philadelphia Fusion, and South Korea’s Seoul Dynasty.The West will not be affected by the changes and will start the season as before on May 5 Scheduled.
“We’re delaying the Eastern Conference schedule by two weeks until May 20,” Overwatch League head Sean Miller said in a video update posted today. “So all 21 games will still be played, but for two weeks, and the Kickoff Clash tournament in both regions will be in June.”
Now, the fate of live Overwatch League events also seems less certain. Blizzard began canceling Overwatch League events in early 2020 at the start of the pandemic, before transitioning to online-only competitions for the remainder of the season.It attempted to return to live events in 2021, but ultimately plans to have live events in the 2021 playoffs fall down.
Blizzard will try again this year, with three live events currently planned in the West: the Texas Battle between the Houston Outlaws and the Dallas Fuel at the start of the season on May 6, as well as two regional championships and Toronto hosted by the Dallas Fuel Defenders.
“Given the rapid changes in the COVID-19 situation, we are exploring the best route to this year’s global competition with the goal of returning to LAN events,” Miller said. “So, depending on the situation, safety and fair play are always our top priorities as we want to build the most exciting thing we can do.” He added that more details would be announced in the coming weeks.
Miller noted that this will be the Overwatch League’s first live appearance in Toronto, but Canada’s Covid-19 vaccination rules could complicate things: MLB team Boston Red Sox will be forced to leave unvaccinated players For example, when playing in Toronto next week. The Red Sox are also currently dealing with the virus outbreak.
China has been grappling with a sharp rebound in Covid-19 cases in recent weeks, leading to a weeks-long lockdown in Shanghai, a city of 25 million. The municipality has recently tightened restrictions and aggressively pursued a “zero-coronavirus” strategy, but residents are reportedly growing increasingly angry about the strategy: guardian Many in the city are facing loss of income and shortages of food and other essentials, while a large number of residents have been asked to relocate in order to sanitize their neighborhoods, the report said.