The Nations Cup got underway in the pools stage. Some
of the pool matches were brutal with highly ranked nations
like the U.S., featuring Marcello Margott, Ryan Greenspan,
Tim Montressor and Bear Degidio making short work of
lesser-known paintball nations such as India. Australia had
a solid opening day with a nail biting 4-2 win over Sweden
and a solid 4-0 win over the Philippines. The home team,
Malaysia had a vocal crowd of supporters cheering their
every move.
By the end of day 2 we had a picture of the finals for all
divisions. In Division 1, fully funded DYE team AISAWAN
topped the preliminaries whilst STK from Australia were
the best placed of the Aussies in 4th. PC Gridlock were
the pick of the Australian teams in Division 2 and Red Raw
and Insidious scraped through in Division 3. Our Nations
Cup team really struggled on Saturday, losing 4-0 and 2-0
to strong European outfits, and eventual finalists Austria
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and Norway and this meant the end for the Australian
campaign.
Sunday. It’s why you play. Neither division 3 team managed
to make it through the first round of finals. STK met
AISAWAN in the Quarter finals, which was my pick for most
entertaining games at the event. With just over 1 minute
on the clock, favorites for the event AISAWAN held a 2-1
lead, the STK boys played an aggressive, yet measured
point to tie it up with 9 seconds to go. Extra time was
required and in a long, grueling point, a very unfortunate
call for a hit on the hopper drew a penalty against STK
in Dorito 50 ultimately lead to their downfall. AISAWAN
advanced and eventually were crowned winners defeating
the Californian team Cobra Kai in the final.
Australia’s best result in the event belonged to Perth
based PC Gridlock who finished 4th in Division 2. Inception