India to open World Esports Championship campaign with CS:GO on December 2
In their opening match against Tajikistan on December 2, the Indian CS: GO squad will be spearheading the nation's push at the IESF's 14th World Esports Championship. The India team led by Ritesh Sarda also includes Shuvajyoti Chakraborty, Anshul Adarkar, Hrishikesh Shenoy, and Harsh Jain.
The squad will be motivated to secure a podium result after finishing in the eighth position in the last iteration of the competition hosted in Eilat, Israel.
Team India CS: GO, captain, Ritesh Sarda said, "It's been a great honour to represent India back-to-back in the WEC. We as a team are excited and prepared to play in the upcoming WEC starting next week in Bali. The world finals is going to be a huge spectacle. With the right mentality and proper grind, we have high hopes for the tournament and will try to bring the laurels to the country."
The International Esports Federation (IESF) is in charge of organising the forthcoming 14th World Esports Championship, which will include elite athletes from more than 120 nations playing in six different Esports games, including the newcomers PUBG Mobile and Mobile Legends: Bang Bang.
The event, which has a huge prize fund of USD 500K (about INR 4 crores), will take place in Bali from December 1 to December 12. The athletes that competed for India on Team India last competed in the World Esports Championship in Eilat and won the National Qualifiers (NESC2022).
India will take part in CS: GO as well as the Tekken 7 and eFootball games.
"This is another great opportunity post the Commonwealth Esports Championship for India's esports athletes to prove their metal. With Olympics also announcing "Olympic Esports Week", esports is inching towards its Woodstock moment; and medals in events like CEC, WEC will help in establishing India as a dominant-esports powerhouse' globally. This set of our athletes has great potential and we are confident that they will give a tough challenge to the world's best and emerge victorious and make our glorious nation proud. I wish them all the very best and look forward to see them triumph in their respective titles," said Yugal Kishore Sharma, Director of the Esports Federation of India.
India will compete in the Tekken 7 and eFootball championships with Hitesh Khorwal (Rcool) and Hemanth Kommu (Peshemak7), respectively. In Group E, Khorwal will compete against athletes from Pakistan, the Bahamas, Venezuela, and Palestine. On December 3, he will face off against Lucius Antoine of the Bahamas.
Watch out for the Indian's matchup with Pakistan's Arslan Siddique, which will take on the same day as his first game. Earlier this year, Arslan won the VSFighting X, Dreamhack 2022, and Combo Breaker 2022 championships.
In contrast, Kommu will compete in Group P alongside athletes from Kazakhstan, Armenia, and Guinea. On December 3, he will face Cheick Conde of Guinea in his debut game.
For Tekken 7, the group stage matches will be played in a best-of-three style, while CS: GO will use a best-of-one format. In the CS: GO and Tekken 7 games, the top two teams from each group will advance to the next round after the group stage, however, for eFootball, only the group's top team will advance.