NP receive one year ban from DreamLeague

NP have decided to withdraw for the second time in a row from a DreamLeague season, a decision that comes with one year ban for the entire organization.

DreamLeague suffered a massive wave of teams withdrawing from the tournament last year. Six out of the eight initial participants have dropped from the LeaguePlay stage during season six. One of these six were NP, who were actually added to the group play as a replacement for Team Secret. Despite NP not being an European team, DreamLeague allowed them to play last year against all the other seven EU participants. However, after losing several matches NP withdrew from the event mentioning that they have a packed schedule and therefore could not continue to play. Due to their dropping out mid group stage, NP was disqualified last year and they  lost all their winnings ($1,000/match won).

With the seventh edition, DreamLeague announced a separate NA division for the LeaguePlay and according to the tournament organizers, they have discussed with NP back in February about their participation.  

For Season 7 we had a talk with Team NP in February about their withdrawal in Season 6 and we jointly decided to let the past be and move forward. They accepted our invite to Season 7 in mid February and we received word from them just two weeks ago that they will drop out of DreamLeague to play another event.”

This time around, NP withdrew even before the NA division kicked off, to honor the Zotac Cup invitation. The DreamLeague NA division is set to commence on the 30th of May and Zotac Cup starts on the exact same day. With NP flying to Taipei to play in the $100,000 LAN event, DreamLeague decided to issue a one year ban to the NP organization and invited the Kiev Major South American sensation, SG e-sports to replace them.

Due to dropping out of DreamLeague Season 6 and Season 7, Team NP has been issued a one year ban. This ban applies to Team NP as an organization. SG esports will now be playing on Team NP’s schedule slots. This means they will be playing Thunderbirds May 30th, 18:30 CEST.”

Just like the recently finished EU LeaguePlay, the NA division will be held in a  best-of-two Round Robin format with the winners qualifying to the DreamHack Atlanta LAN event.

DreamLeague Season 7 NA division participants:

compLexity Gaming
Thuderbirds
Digital Chaos
 SG e-sports

Winners of the NA division will join Team Secret, Vega Squadron and Team Liquid in Atlanta this July, only a few weeks before TI7. The Playoffs LAN will be held July 21-22 with a $175,000 prize pool on the line. The organizers also offer boot camp conditions to all the teams attending both DreamHack Atlanta and The International 7.

source: dreamleague.dreamhack.com