Just after the on-line
Test Match between South Africa on 8 August 2014, a gamer said to me,
“We (I presume he meant SA) should not be sending teams overseas,
we should only be spending all our money on teams in South Africa”.
I was flabbergasted!
Really!
How short sighted....
It is well known that
the standard of play in South Africa already falls far behind the
international norm, and yet here is a gamer actually advocating that
South Africa remains in its own little puddle.
Yes, by all means, let
us not test ourselves against international competition, let us only
play amongst ourselves.
To do that, would be a
travesty. South African teams would never, ever get any better and
would only ever be able to measure themselves against other mediocre
South African teams.
The MSSA, through the
MWEB sponsorship, is able to, year-on-year, send teams overseas to
help try and raise the standard.
Not only that, but the MSSA
also helps teams to go overseas. For example, in 2013, had it not
been for the help that the MSSA gave to Energy eSports, Energy
eSports would not have attended the ESWC.
The biggest problem
seems to be that South African gamers in general do not have a clue
about the standard of play in top line competition.
It is very
easy to tear down other people's efforts when sitting on the
sidelines and trying to put yourself up as a community leader when in
fact, you have no basis whatsoever to even claim that you are a
community leader.
Yes the 2013 Protea Team for Dota 2 was
ripped apart by Romania, and yes the 2014 Protea Team was beaten by
Egypt, but in the absence of continued and active participation by
South African teams on an international level, it is indeed difficult
to say if any other South African team could have done any better.
The reason I say that
is because the game changes in an international test match. There is
a lot more pressure. You know everyone is watching, and waiting for a
chance to criticize.
Just look at the 2013
Protea Team, 4 players were from Bvd, 1 from Energy, and a further 2
reserves from Energy as well. However, gamers immediately began to
criticize the team by saying that they were not good enough.
So, for all those
gamers who think that the MSSA should not be sending teams overseas,
I put it to you that you are looking at the issue with only yourself
in mind. You are not looking at the bigger picture of development,
growing the community and international participation. You are only
looking at it from a point of view of what you can get out out of
it.....
Sad, very sad!
