It’s an exciting time for Hearthstone esports and the UK scene. The new Nationals tournament has just concluded and 16 players have qualified for the next ESL Premiership.
Arise SirSalty
First up – the UK Nationals. This took place this weekend (June 23rd and 24th). The Nationals is a new tournament from Blizzard announced back in March which covers seven European countries: the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Poland and Russia.
Each country had its own 64-player tournament with a $5,000 prize pool. Day one featured a Swiss format stage, with the top eight players reaching day two’s single-elimination bracket.
The UK Nationals winner was David “SirSalty” Chee, who beat experienced UK player and former ESL Prem and Insomnia champion George “BoarControl” Webb in the final.
You can see the UK’s final eight and the overall winners across the other territories here:
Congratulations to our 7 #Hearthstone National Champions. GG WP! #HSNationals #Esports
?? @Hs_SirSalty
?? @Draz_HS
?? @HS_Seiko
?? Bèp92
?? @dawidohs
?? @Rikitikitavi_hs
?? @BIGEldrazi pic.twitter.com/1lpW5jK4xV
— Wei Yue (@Wei2Yu3) June 24, 2018
16 players qualify for ESL Prem
The next ESL UK & Ireland Hearthstone Premiership for Summer 2018 is preparing to kick off.
The fifth season of Hearthstone’s ESL Prem sees eight returning players and eight new challengers battling for the biggest prize pool that ESL UK has ever offered for the competition.
16 players will compete for their share of £8,000, with the final taking place at the ESL Arena at EGX on September 22nd and 23rd. The competition is expected to start on the first Friday of July.
The seven players taking part in the Summer Season that re-qualified from last year are Danswf, HelloLeeroy, Coldhands, BoarControl, Mysterious, ToastMonster and BigBen – with the latter two the runner-up and winner from season four.
Deathsie would have secured an invitation back to the Prem, but after relocating to pursue his Hearthstone career elsewhere, he is unable to receive a invitation back to this season to participate. So a ninth player made it in from the qualifiers to take his spot.
Ben “BigBen” Chapman, season four’s winner, said: “It’s great to be back for another season of the Premiership. There have been many changes and new faces since the last tournament it’ll be exciting to see how it pans out.”
The 16 qualified players in total are:
Hearthstone ESL Premiership Summer 2018 Qualified Players:
BoarControl ? ?
BigBen ?
Jambre ?
Mysterious ?
ToastMonster ?
Bilbz
Coldhands
Danswf
DeadDraw
Duncan
Falcone
HelloLeeroy
Kat
Osha
Paradox
Westwith
Let’s make it a season to remember. pic.twitter.com/n9fvxMGhSN
— Dan Gaskin (@DanGaskin) June 20, 2018
Going Global
Then there’s the Hearthstone Global Games which get underway on July 17th and feature 48 different countries.
The players chosen to represent the UK are as follows: BoarControl, Toastmonster, J4ckiechan and GreenSheep, the latter two also taking part in last year’s tournament.
You can see the full list of participating players and teams in the Hearthstone Global Games here.
Dom is an award-winning writer and finalist of the Esports Journalist of the Year 2023 award. He graduated from Bournemouth University with a 2:1 degree in Multi-Media Journalism in 2007.
As a long-time gamer having first picked up the NES controller in the late ’80s, he has written for a range of publications including GamesTM, Nintendo Official Magazine, industry publication MCV and others. He worked as head of content for the British Esports Federation up until February 2021, when he stepped back to work full-time on Esports News UK and offer esports consultancy and freelance services. Note: Dom still produces the British Esports newsletter on a freelance basis, so our coverage of British Esports is always kept simple – usually just covering the occasional press release – because of this conflict of interest.
