The third and final Continental Championship of 2024, for the Europe, Middle East and Africa region (EMEA), took place in Bergamo, Italy, 28th-30th June. As the biggest in-person tournament outside of North America this year, there was a lot of hype building around EMEA 2024 – and the event more than delivered.
EMEA Bergamo was more than just a Standard tournament. From Friday’s Throwback Team Tournament to cube draft to Netrunner-themed talks to live music to stalls selling all sorts of Netrunner goodies, the weekend was a real festival of Netrunner. Lead organiser Atien and her team did an incredible job, and I’ve seen many players saying it was one of the best experiences in their Netrunner lives.
And on top of all that, the main event itself saw a stacked field of 111 players battle it out through seven rounds of double-sided swiss. By the end of the first day, Shaper was looking strongest on the Runner side – in particular, no less than four Rielle ‘Kit’ Peddler decks made the top 16! Among Corp decks, the big winners were Ob: Superheavy Logistics and Azmari EdTech. Four very different Ob decks made the top 16, showing the versatility of the Weyland identity, accompanied by three copies of a breakout new Azmari Reeducation combo deck that achieved a startlingly high winrate over the whole tournament.
After coming in second at the American Continental Championship, jan tuno went one better, going undefeated in the top 16 to take the EMEA title! The final saw it face off against fellow Ob pilot ryanbantwins, but after back to back victories as Ob in the loser’s bracket, ryan was not able to overcome tuno’s highly technical Ob play in the grand final. Adding a Continental title to its Circuit Breaker title, tuno is on course for a truly historic season.
With both tuno and third place finisher AugustusCaesar already qualified for the Intercontinental Championship, and fifth place finisher CobraBubbles (yes, the same handsome player who wrote this very article) unable to attend, the invites to InterContinentals get passed down to the following players:
- Worlds 2023 13th place finisher ryanbantwins
- Kikai, the long-time mainstay of the UK scene whose new blog The Surveyor carries in-depth analysis of all three Continentals
- Five-time Worlds top cut competitor and 2023 EMEA finalist Bridgeman
- Worlds 2019 finalist testrunning
- Netrunner’s greatest travel writer xiaat
With the last invites handed out, the stage is set for one of the most competitive events in the Netrunner calendar. Learn more about the players with Kikai’s excellent player profiles over on The Surveyor. Then tune in to twitch.tv/nullsignalnetrunner from 14.00 UTC this Saturday, 13th July, to see 16 of the very best duke it out to determine the 2024 Intercontinental Champion!
