Every time an international event is approaching, visa concerns for most of the East European players as well as Chinese players goes in the spotlight. WCG 2008 Grand Final in Cologne, Germany next month is sadly not an exception.

It is the second time in two months that the n!faculty player, Quaix had his dream of participating in an international event shattered because of visa problem after ESWC 2008 Grand Final. It is meanwhile the first time for Sting to qualify for an event of such scale, but he could do nothing but wait until next year due to the same reason, according to ProPlay.

The fourth place and the fifth place in the Russian qualifier, Nicker59 and Happy will hence succeed their places in WCG Grand Final. With the third place of BlizzCon 2008, Happy replacing Sting, the tough Group B will become much tougher as it already hosts the Gravitas pair Yoan 'ToD' Merlo and Samuli 'elfittaja' Sihvonen as well as Bychkov 'Ghost' Aleksey before this incident. Nicker59 in the meantime will go into Group F with Serious Gaming pair Yaraslau 'NightWOlf' Kavetski and Hamish Luke 'Kowi' Parker being his only major competitors.

Group B
Romanas 'Lose' Rimkus
Yoan 'ToD' Merlo
Samuli 'elfittaja' Sihvonen
Poddy
Milos 'Mickey' Mitrovic
Bychkov 'Ghost' Aleksey
Dmitriy 'Happy' Kostin

Group F
Slovenia (1st)
Hristo 'Yo' Shumanov
Yaraslau 'NightWOlf' Kavetski
Diego Echeagaray
Switzerland (1st)
Hamish Luke 'Kowi' Parker
Nikita 'Nicker' Pomadov

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Image credits: WCG Official Website