MIBR decline Melbourne invite

Yesterday, ESL revealed the four invites for ESL Challenger Melbourne. Grayhound received the local hero invite, while Complexity, IHC, and Bad News Eagles were extended invites based on their placement in the ESL World Ranking.

A Brazilian fan inquired why MIBR were not given an invite, since at the time of the announcement, MIBR placed 19th on ESL's World Ranking, while Bad News Eagles placed 20th.

MIBR's strategic coach, tacitus, responded that MIBR actually did receive an invitation, but decided to decline it after careful consideration. tacitus laid out their team's reasons, citing the 23+ hour flight, and the dramatic time zone shift from IEM Rio, the tournament directly before ESL Challenger Melbourne.

With IEM Rio ending on April 23rd and ESL Challenger at Dreamhack Melbourne beginning on April 28th, that would only give the team a few short days to take the almost 24-hour flight, adapt to fourteen hours of time zone shift, and prepare for their upcoming matches. The team decided to rest following Rio, and perhaps will take that time to prepare for the BLAST Paris Major, scheduled to begin on May 8th.