Why is the next major Dota 2 tournament only including one Chinese team?

The Electronic Sports League’s (ESL) next major Dota 2 tournament, the ESL One New York 2014, is starting soon. But those hoping to once again see the prowess of Chinese teams might be disappointed to learn that China will only get one spot.

No news has been revealed for the China qualifiers as of yet, but we expect it to be a similar system to the North America and Europe qualifiers, which will consist of two stages. The first is an open bracket tournament which allows any team to sign up and compete. From this tournament, the top four teams in each country will move on to the next stage, the invitational bracket.

From the official ESL One New York 2014 website:

In the invitational bracket, the four best teams from the open bracket will be joined by invited teams. These teams feature the best players and squads in the world and have previously competed in many world class tournaments. With their success in the record books, these teams have secured themselves a seed in the 2nd round of the qualifiers.

But for a tournament which focuses on showcasing the “best players and squads in the world”, it’s strange that China will only receive one slot, whereas North America will receive three and Europe, four. It’s even more strange after how much Chinese teams have proven themselves, especially with Newbee winning the The International 2014 (TI4) championship, Vici Gaming becoming the TI4 runner-up, and Invictus Gaming winning the ESL One Frankfurt 2014 tournament earlier this year. So what’s going on?

Newbee wins The International 2014

One comment points to the numerous Chinese Dota 2 players retiring after TI4, and how most teams are unwilling to play with their new rosters. But is that really true? Does that mean these teams won’t even join the China qualifiers, passing up a chance to test their strength against the world? We think not. After all, the situation is the same for many European and North American teams and quite frankly, which top team hasn’t gone through a roster change?

(See: BurNIng and rOtk officially announce retirement as players)

So that brings us to a second, and much more obvious, conclusion: everyone is scared of Chinese teams. But would ESL, an organization based in Europe, really show bias against China? Are they really that scared that China will once again dominate the tournament and so alienate its mainly Western-based audience? Maybe, maybe not. But in any case, it’ll be a pretty boring “international” tournament if you throw a single Chinese team against multiple European and North American teams. What do you think is the reason?