In case you haven’t noticed, Call of Duty is kind of a big thing in Australia. And not just sales of the game itself, but the eSports scene.
The most recent Australia & New Zealand qualifier for next year’s Call of Duty World League, for instance, had 50 teams. That’s a huge turnout, as you’d expect for entry into a professional division that is sporting a US$150,000 prize pool per stage.
But perhaps the biggest news of all is this: as part of the online qualifiers, one female has become the first professional Call of Duty player to qualify for the World League. She’s from Perth, and her name is Kayla Squires.
She’s 19 and she’s a member of team Pure N3gs, who solidified their spot as one of the 8 teams in next year’s first Pro Division stage after knocking off team Viable 3-2. Squires, whose Twitter following has more than doubled overnight, told Dexerto following the win that she was “ecstatic”.
“It just shows that plenty of hard work and dedication will definitely pay off in the long run, I hope I can inspire other girls to do the same,” she said.
Congratulations to @Squizzay, the first female player to make the CoD World League – https://t.co/nfnTaWj5bh – pic.twitter.com/g3kgzF1z9x
— Dexerto.com (@Dexerto) December 15, 2015
The reaction has been understandably ecstatic, but perhaps the most poignant was this couple of notes from veteran eSports reporter Rod Breslau.
Kayla (@Squizzay) shows that women can play on men’s teams and compete, win against the best. Hope to see this in other team esports games.
— Rod Breslau (@Slasher) December 15, 2015
Call of Duty next year is going to be huge. On the prize money alone, it’ll dwarf the amount players can earn from CS:GO, Dota 2, Starcraft 2 and League of Legends comfortably, with Activision giving out US$300,000 across the two Pro League stages. There’s the potential to earn even more than that as well, with the best Australian teams going through to a global finals (although all the precise details and figures are yet to be announced).
I’ve reached out to Squires for an interview. In the interim, however, it’s nice to see that Australians are continuing the lead the charge in more ways than one.
Comments
7 responses to “The First Female To Qualify For The Call Of Duty World League Is Australian”
There is something cool about esports that allows different genders to compete against eachother. Shouldn’t really be a surprise, though – I think I know more women who play CoD than men, now.
Most men play CoD between sporting events, fishing charters and gym sessions.
“Hey brah, how many chinups do you think can I do before I respawn?”
“What was that brah? I was just snapchatting a pic of the shit I just took to Jacko!”
This is likely why I stopped playing cod, overhearing that garbage. I used to be competitive still though I would want to see how formidable their team is.
Oh yeah wait that’s why I quit.. Getting 20+kills and under 10deaths and still losing because my team-mates where a mix of primary school kids or jobless uneducated hicks living off the dole.
The one time I signed up for a tournament I remember we won the first round then I never heard from the team again (the team owner apologiesed weeks later saying it fell apart cos they were too busy/unorganised.
Fun times.
not to make to big a deal about it because it shouldn’t really be a surprise but Congrats to Kayla, and the rest of her team for making it as far as they have.
I don’t understand. I’m from Perth, Australia. And for one, i can’t get into any decent games. I’m always put into American or European lobbies. Even when it ends up in an Australian lobby. Perth to Sydney host is still pretty far, and im still always having slight latency.
I’d love to know her setup, ISP and console.
For anyone wondering, the Avg net in Perth is 2mb down / .6mb up.
Where do you live in Perth to get those atrocious speeds?
That is no where near the norm for Perth, you should talk to your ISP if you are getting that as your maximum Up/Down. Im 2km from my exchange and i get 14.3 down / 1.1 up.
I live in perth and my speeds are also around 2mb down and .6mb up, I can also confirm my friends is around the same as well.
Good on her! Good to see more and more girls in the league!
I’m confused, it’ll dwarf other esports with a $300k USD prize pool? Didn’t Dota have close to 18 million?
Not sure how 300k dwarfs 18mill, hell Halo is at 3mill isn’t it?