Pokémon Unite’s shrinking Worlds team roster has me worried
Just three days before the Pokémon World Championships kick off for 2025, two qualified Pokémon Unite teams from China have dropped from the competition. While Champion Road and Nova aren’t the only teams that have withdrawn from the bracket ahead of the tournament, they’re the only ones whose reasons for doing so are unknown.
The 2025 World Championship is a big moment for Pokémon Unite, as it’s the first time in the free Pokémon game’s history that the finals are taking place on Championship Sunday, alongside VGC, TCG, and Go. At the end of July, the Unite eSports account announced the 31 qualified teams and their respective groups for day one of the competition, but since then, four teams have dropped, leaving Group F with just two teams competing.
Peru’s Infamous withdrew from the tournament due to visa issues, and South Korea’s newly-formed LastDance backed out due to lack of synergy and in-fighting, but it’s still unclear why China’s Nova and Champion Road will not be competing. Japan’s Pokémon Unite account simply cites “various circumstances” [machine translation], grouping the two with LastDance. The lack of reasoning has led the community to speculate that it’s because of how differently Pokémon Unite operates in China.
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Just three days before the Pokémon World Championships kick off for 2025, two qualified Pokémon Unite teams from China have dropped from the competition. While Champion Road and Nova aren’t the only teams that have withdrawn from the bracket ahead of the tournament, they’re the only ones whose reasons for doing so are unknown. The…