Albion 2 (July 1st and 2nd)

Following the roaring excitement of last year’s debut of Albion, an all new European Smash Bros tournament here in the UK, made it’s return this July for its second hype installment. The DAT team, tournament organisers for the UK, were in top form after a short hiatus, finishing both the 306 man Smash 4 bracket and 62 man Melee bracket in a single weekend with round robin pools all within schedule. The UK might not have the best players just yet, but they certainly have made a case this tournament for the best TO team.

Melee was smaller with 62 entrants, however, there was still some quality players with Professor Pro, Vanity Angel and Alphadash battling it out in the tournament to see who is the best. No prizes for guessing who came out on top!

Moving onto Smash 4, the pools were Round Robin with 9-10 players in a pool.There were a few upsets in pools, one of the major ones was in pool A8 as Owlbabies was seeded 1st in his pool, defeating the top seed eViL Schligger, which resulted in him not making it out of pools. Owlbabies has been hyped up for quite some time, however, he certainly didn’t disappoint and managed to live up to it.Another major surprise was pool B5 where BWC came 2nd in this pool instead of 2nd seed WG_Reecepect who came 5th. Despite Reecepect’s amazing and consistent Megaman play throughout previous tournaments, it didn’t look like Albion 2 was his time. In pool D1, Anaky came 2nd in his pool, an old Toon Link player from the Brawl era that stopped participating in most tournaments at around 2015. His last significant Smash 4 appearance was at the last Albion, so this retired player still has enough time to put a stopper on the up and coming next generation of UK Smashers. There were a few close calls in other pools as LTBrad being 3rd in his pool by one game loss in a tense three-way tie with J. Miller and Adom also being unable to make it out of pools due to a similar issue.

Our very own newly sponsored Second Wind players also showed an admirable performance at Albion 2. Jaxter may have come 10th in his pool, but him and his brother Wefferino placed well in doubles with them coming 33rd. S-Critical was outstanding in Albion, although very barely drowning in pools, he came 22nd in doubles with Smashbound, eliminating the veteran team Ixis/CRZ on the way. Well done to both of them and we hope to see more from them in the future.

In the regional crew battles, Germany came 1st with France in 2nd followed by the South of England in 3rd. The highlight of the crew battle event was France vs Scotland, France’s The Flow dominated the Scottish competition with the young lion, Roy, taking 8 stocks, whilst taking out players such as Yackabean and Taroast before finally getting beaten by Pidgey. It seems Albion Crew Battles are an excellent space for Fire Emblem mains, with The Flow following from Matsu’s performance last year with Marth.

1st Germany 2nd France 3rd Netherlands 3rd South England 5th North England 5th Scotland 5th Northern Ireland 5th Sweden

The very last event was the money match between the JDI deity Justice vs Airfire21. With Airfire21 on the hype of his win at MD against Justice and then making a twitlonger boasting about the win and the improvements that he wanted to do, it was bound to happen. The £20 money match was quick and resulted in a 3-0 victory to Justice.

On Sunday, doubles finished with Schligger/LoNg0uw at 3rd place, Glutonny and Ntai_kai at 2nd place and Purple~H and Cyve taking 1st place overall.



1st Purple~H & Cyve 2nd Schligger & LoNg0uw 3rd Glutonny & Ntai_kai 4th S1 & Ramses 5th AfroSmash & JMiller 5th Plastic Poptart & Matsu 7th Skarfelt & Ander 7th iStudying & Gregs

Following on from doubles top 8, lead us into top 64 of WiiU singles. t started off with a bang as iStudying was sent to losers by Afrosmash in Winners Round 1. Other major upsets included a huge number of UK PR’d players falling off early, with J. Miller and Aperture getting 33rd and Jack Hunter, Khanage, DX17 and Plastic Poptart getting 49th in Pro Bracket. However, to people’s surprise, Lucretio got an outstanding 13th place bringing a ton of hype with a crowd during his sets. Yackabean, the Scottish Toon Link, came 13th with Dr.Dorf and Peli. Afrosmash just missed out on top 8, coming 9th after losing to Owlbabies in Winners Round 3 and M in top 8 Losers qualifiers.

Melee top 8 had some exciting moments but Professor Pro took with a 3-1 victory over Vanity Angel.

(Vods will be uploaded on DAT Team youtube.)

1st Professor Pro 2nd Vanity Angel 3rd TimeMuffin PHD 4th Setchi 5th Alphadash 5th R23 7th Unhaven 7th Okameed

Top 8 was definitely something out of the ordinary, as well as regulars Cyve, Glutonny and Ixis in top 8, there was a lot of expected competitors such as Supersemmie, MagiMagi, M and two wildcards in top 8 with Wusi and Owlbabies. Wusi and M got 7th place with Wusi losing to SupahSemmie and M losing to Ixis, On winners side, Owlbabies lost to Glutonny and MagiMagi lost to Cyve sending them both to losers. Owlbabies and SuperSemmie finished 5th place, with Owlbabies losing to Ixis bringing it back with a reverse 3-0 and SuperSemmie losing to MagiMagi. Props to Owlbabies for making UK’s number 1 have to work hard for his win, throughout his first major UK tournament showing. In Winners’ Finals, Glutonny defeated Cyve 3-1, sending Cyve to losers. In Losers Semis, Ixis lost to MagiMagi 1-3 with MagiMagi double eliminating Ixis. MagiMagi advanced to have a rematch against Cyve, the match was close but Cyve won 2-3. Grand finals were Glutonny vs Cyve. Cyve made it close but Glutonny took the set and avoided bracket reset and took the tournament 3-2. (All sets are on BYOController youtube channel).

1st Glutonny 2nd Cyve 3rd MagiMagi 4th Ixis 5th Owlbabies 5th SupahSemmie 7th Wusi 7th M

That’s the end of Albion 2, it was a stunning event that brought a lot of hype for the European Circuit. I would like to say major thanks to DAT Team for allowing me to report and do interviews on the event itself and the planning that went behind it. Secondly, thanks to BYO_Controller for streaming the event and Zowie for the monitors used, thirdly to Nintendo who actually brought ARMS which was always fun to play and was always busy and lastly, everyone that came and is reading this post. If you want to keep updated on what we do, follow us on Twitter @2ndwindgame.

Until Next time!