eUnited lead the field in Contenders EU Qualifier 1

Europe's finest lined out today for a shot at qualification for Blizzard's Overwatch Contenders event. A $50,000 carrot was dangling in the back of their minds, but the only objective today was to finish in the top eight.

There was a strong showing with 439 of the 760 registered European teams checking in for Saturday's bracket, but of the four teams given preferential seeding – eUnited, Movistar Riders, Ninjas in Pyjamas and Misfits – only three would qualify today.

Final standings

The eight teams that were knocked out in today's Round of 16 will also receive preferential seeding tomorrow if they choose to participate:

Cyclowns, Ninjas With Attitude, GamersOrigin, Team expert, Ninjas in Pyjamas, ZenGaming eSports, CoolCatClan and Team Bounty Hunters

Road to the final

eUnited's journey to the final actually seemed to get progressively easier after a tight 2-1 win over Cyclowns in the Round of 16. They would dispatch Vivi's Adventure en route a slightly mismatched semifinal against Team Singularity Ninjas in which they full held Route 66 and eventually won out on Nepal despite a spirited performance from the Danes who were playing with kragie instead of their star DPS, KrytoX.

On the other side of the bracket Misfits kicked off the official broadcast with a spicy quarterfinal grudge match against Laser Kittenz that wasn't as hot as originally billed. However, the heat would be turned up in their semifinal clash with Movistar Riders. In fact, the Swedes were sweating bullets by the time Route 66 reached it's climax – finishing 30 metres short of an impressive Riders second attack that had come to a halt just shy of completion. However, after a breather Misfits prowess on Control and 2CP would shine through to swing the series back in their favour.

Our resident analyst Sideshow offered his thoughts on the matchup:

Misfits have beaten Movistar Riders in three separate series now - PIT groups, TaKeOver groups, Contenders qualifier - despite Movistar progressing much further than them in the first two via double elim. Bogey team in the making, Misfits always light up when they're playing these guys.

Misfits may well have overexerted themselves in that semifinal. Their performance in the final paled in comparison as they allowed vallutaja to run roughshod over them. Watchpoint: Gibraltar was a Tracer clinic for the clean-shaven Estonian. It briefly seemed like Misfits could stabilize on Nepal after they claimed the opening round, but eUnited were unrelenting. Kudos to sharyk for pulling the rug out from under the Misfits comeback dreams right at the end with an epic Primal Rage triple jump to keep the control point active on Sanctum.

The rest of the pack

Although from the quarterfinals onward it was pretty much business as usual for Europe's elite, elsewhere in the bracket there had been significant misfortune and intrigue brewing.

The headline upset has to go to 123 taking down Ninjas in Pyjamas in two maps in the Round of 16. NiP had been fielding current trialist LiNkzr in place of mafu, but even zappis's flatmate, JIRI "FINLAND'S GIFT TO ESPORTS" MASALIN, was not enough to secure the win against the böda socken / TORNADO.ROX amalgam.

Spare a thought for French free agent superteam, IceblockGG, who ran into Riders in the Round of 32 and UB Team who had to hit the showers after meeting Laser Kittenz in the Round of 64.

There are a raft of other genuine threats and oddities that failed to make the Round of 16 who will be hoping for better luck on Sunday including France's Team LDLC, Russia's Seqta, Spain's Wizards Esports Club, United Arab Emirates' YaLLa Esports and an interesting looking SWE/ITA offering Altered Vision that features ryb, draceus and carnifex.

The broadcast resumes tomorrow at 14:00 EDT / 20:00 CEST / 03:00 KST, but you can find detailed results and player streams from the earlier rounds right here.