Just a moment ago, the organizing committee of the Vietnam Championship Series (VCS) officially announced the plan to continue postponing the VCS Summer 2021 indefinitely, due to the ongoing complicated situation of the COVID-19 pandemic. The specific content is as follows:
[Announcement of the VCS Summer 2021 continuing to be postponed]
Due to the complicated developments of the Covid-19 pandemic in Ho Chi Minh City, the organizing committee (OC) of the VCS, including Garena and representatives from Riot Games, after discussing and reaching a consensus on this decision.
With the desire to ensure fairness, as well as comply with the standards of the League of Legends tournament system, operating a professional tournament needs to ensure the following factors:
Ensuring matches are conducted under the direct supervision of qualified referees.
Ensuring professional competition conditions regarding network connectivity, competitive equipment, and venue.
Ensuring the health safety of all professional players and staff before, during, and after the tournament.
According to Directive 16 of the Government currently being applied in Ho Chi Minh City, the OC realizes that it will be very difficult to ensure the above standards of a professional tournament. After discussions and mutual agreement between both parties, the VCS OC regrets to announce that the tournament will continue to be postponed to further monitor the pandemic situation.
We sincerely hope for your understanding regarding the current situation.
The VCS organizing committee respectfully announces.
According to the VCS organizing committee, continuing to postpone the tournament in the current complicated pandemic situation is a necessary decision. Additionally, the reason the VCS cannot be organized even before Ho Chi Minh City upgraded its social distancing measures is partially explained.
According to evaluations from Garena and Riot, competing online still requires the presence of a referee team as well as staff, and to ensure the quality and transparency of matches, this referee and staff team would have to frequently move to the teams’ Gaming Houses, which is somewhat incompatible with the recommendations to limit movement and gatherings that have been issued since the time when Ho Chi Minh City first experienced the outbreak of cases.
The VCS organizing committee also hopes to receive understanding from the audience, as it is unable to hold the Summer 2021 tournament as planned.
With this situation, it can be said that the opportunity for Vietnamese League of Legends representatives to participate in Worlds 2021 is almost gone. Firstly, regarding the competition schedule, the VCS is currently the only region among the six major leagues that has not been able to start the summer tournament, and this situation is expected to last at least until the end of July.
Therefore, even if the schedule is crammed, the VCS Summer 2021 will not finish in time to prepare for Worlds. Additionally, the issue of traveling to the host country for the tournament remains challenging, also due to the impact of the pandemic. For this reason, perhaps League of Legends fans in Vietnam have somewhat accepted that the chance to attend Worlds 2021 is over, as the priority that must be placed first remains pandemic prevention.