Overwatch League’s Shanghai Dragons are All Set for Stage Three After Settling Players’ Visa Issues

Nothing has gone right for the Overwatch League’s Shanghai Dragons during the team’s inaugural season. As the second stage of the season nears its end, the Dragons remain the league’s sole winless team and maintain a .11 map win percentage. Two of their current roster members, Chao “Undead” Fang and Lu “Diya” Weida, will not be available for the remainder of season after returning home to China due to “personal” and “family” issues respectively. The absence of Undead and Weida was made worse as four new players signed by the team between the first and second stages have been caught in limbo, as issues around their visas remained up in the air throughout the second stage.

However, Tuesday finally brought some good news for the squad.

The Dragons announced Tuesday that the visa issues surrounding all of the team’s new signings have been squared away and those players will be available for competition when stage three of the OWL season kicks off April 4.

While He “Sky” Junjian and, the Dragons’ most notable signing, Kim “Geguri” Se-Yeon’s ability to come to the U.S. were recently squared away without much resistance, Lee “Fearless” Eui-Seok and Chon “Ado” Gihyeon saw their visa applications hit snags within the Chinese legal system. The team facilitated numerous interviews for both players and finally secured entry into the U.S. on Tuesday. Both players are now stateside and, according to the team’s Twitter, will participate in their first OWL match Wednesday night against the Houston Outlaws. Geguri and Sky are set to join the team sometime before the beginning of stage three.

With not much left to play for ahead of the season’s halfway point, the Dragons can only hope that injecting Ado and Fearless into the roster immediately will quicken their ability to gel with their teammates and facilitate a successful start to the back half of the season come April. Until then, the squad will most likely continue taking their lumps as the second stage winds down. At least the future looks a bit brighter.