Dota 2 – The International 10 won’t take place in Sweden

The International 10 won’t take place in Sweden. After the Swedish government and the Swedish Sports Federation have announced to to not accept esports into the sports federation, Valve has to look fast if they can organize the TI10 somewhere else in Europe. The TI10 was originally planned to take place in Stockholm, Sweden from August 5th to 15.

Sad day for esports in general

This denial basically means that the TI10 would not be directly acknowledged, and as a result, players and staff would have problems getting a visa for Sweden. Now that the decision has been made to not let the TI10 take place, Valve is trying to find a different city that is going to host the TI. It is also still unknown how this potential ruling by the SSF will impact Valve’s planned PGL Stockholm CS Major which is scheduled for October.

Valve says it still plans to hold events in Sweden in the future, but no further details have been made public so far. This final decision was made despite the Swedish Esports Association was working alongside the likes of Alliance to find a solution so that the event could be hosted in Stockholm.

“We find it sad that we received the information so late and that we were not involved before,” chairman of the Swedish Esports Association Sammi Kaidi said. “We have long tried to be a part of the sports movement precisely so as not to end up in situations like this and acted as soon as we got the organizer’s press release, along with calls from professional teams.”

Alliance CEO “Loda” Berg has also expressed his frustration and confusion about the decision: “I don’t understand it on so many levels. The TI is the world’s largest esports event. Other countries beg and ask to be the host nation and Sweden says no. We have been fighting for this and seeing it as the light at the end of the tunnel for almost two years.”

There are still 6 remaining spots at the TI10 and the regional qualifiers to determine them are still going to take place over the next weeks. In the end there will be 18 teams to fight for the lionshare of the 40 Million Dollar prize pool. We are going to keep you updated when we know if and where the TI10 is going to take place.