In 2017, 77 million people in Europe watched eSports broadcasts online. Around four million of them came from German-speaking countries. The Blick Group would like to support the young Swiss eSports scene and so, together with EA Sports and FIFA, it has launched the Blick eSports Cup, Switzerland’s largest FIFA eSports tournament. The event is also a qualification tournament for Switzerland, Germany and Austria for the EA SPORTS FIFA 18 Global Series playoffs, and so allows winners the chance to qualify for the FIFA eWorld Cup 2018.
Gamers can apply from 28 March to 8 April 2018 at esportscup.ch – 240 of them will have the opportunity to compete against German-speaking Europe’s eSports elite on 5 May 2018. Play will take place at 80 gaming stations, on both Sony’s Playstation 4 and Microsoft’s Xbox One. There is not only qualification for the eWorld Cup in store for the winner – there are also non-cash prizes worth over CHF 10,000 in total. The Blick Group will stream the tournament highlights live on Blick.ch, Facebook, YouTube and Twitch. The 12-hour stream will offer glimpses of every aspect of the tournament, the players and eSports. All eSports fans are warmly welcome as spectators at the Congress Center Basel on 5 May.
Lukas Troxler, Head of Product Management Sports at the Blick Group: “Blick aspires to always keep pace with the times. The young target group’s enthusiasm for eSports is overwhelming worldwide, and although the scene is still in its infancy in Switzerland, there is nevertheless a true fan community here – and promising players. Sport is also very important for Blick, so providing a platform for electronic sports was an obvious choice.”
Due to the increasing importance of eSports, the Blick Group will provide more coverage of them in future. With ‘Blick eSports’, we are launching an individual section for digital sport on Blick.ch, Facebook and Instagram. In addition to eSports news, visitors to our social media channels will also find plenty of interesting content on the topic.
The Blick eSports Cup is an accredited official EA SPORTS™ FIFA 18 Global Series qualifier as EA brings competitive FIFA to millions of fans around the world through the EA SPORTS FIFA 18 Global Series on The Road to the FIFA eWorld Cup 2018 in August 2018.
For more details on the entire EA SPORTS FIFA 18 Global Series, please visit www.FUTChampions.com.
Ringier AG, Corporate Communications