February 13 – Germany’s Bundesliga is using eFootball to drive the league deeper into international markets with the launch of the Virtual Bundesliga International Series.
Starting in March the series will open with online Regional Qualifiers hosted in countries including Japan, South Korea, Thailand, Malaysia, India, Brunei, the Philippines, Cambodia, Singapore, East Timor and Vietnam in Asia, as well as Brazil, Colombia, Peru, Chile, Argentina, Mexico, the USA and Canada.
The top qualifiers from the online events will progress to the off-line VBL Continental Qualifiers in April. Players will wear Bundesliga club jerseys for the respective club through to VBL International Final, which will be held in Germany in May 2020.
The Bundesliga is partnering with the Battlefy platform to host the online qualifiers.
Virtual Bundesliga (VBL) first launched in 2012, and now includes the German VBL Open, VBL Club Championship and the VBL Grand Final with more than 100,000 participating online gamers every season. The international series is being organised separately.
Robert Klein, Bundesliga International CEO, said: “Whilst the last seven years have already been amazing, the last three years have really seen the VBL grow internationally with big tournaments in Chile, Malaysia or India. In season 2018/19 the VBL International Series Qualifier included participants from 12 countries, over 10 hours of Virtual Bundesliga action broadcasted across Asia and over 150.000 viewers. The VBL International Final was covered live by 6 Bundesliga broadcasting partners in over 10 countries.”
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