The members of Team Liquid train 50 hours a week. When not practicing, they discuss strategy and tactics, review their previous matches with technical analysis, scouring the footage for weaknesses and areas to improve, while noting the stratagems of their competition.
Upon returning home, the slog continues with one-on-one training late into the night.
On weekends, the team travels to venues to compete against their peers with thousands of rapturous fans cheering and jeering them on. Some could develop injuries, mostly tennis elbow, trigger finger and carpal tunnel syndrome, which could require surgery or lead to the end of their careers.
Team Liquid does not play any traditional sport, nor do they conform to conventional ideals associated with the profession.
They are not rugby players, or cricketers, nor are they footballers, hockey or netball players but they are backed by sponsors, coaches and a bevy of analysts.
They are pro-gamers at the forefront of esports - a movement that is redefining what sport is. If you think this statement is tosh, well, you might just be wrong.
Here’s why.
Recently Activision Blizzard, responsible for the StarCraft series, Warcraft juggernaut and Call of Duty, sold its first seven franchises that will participate in their Overwatch League, the buyers including the owners of the NFL’s New England Patriots and the MLB’s New York Mets.
And they are not the only ‘old school’ sporting franchises in on this movement.
According to a recent The Guardian exposé, Manchester City have began recruiting and contracting players to the club to play EA Sports’ Fifa football simulation games, while more progressive clubs, such as PSG have expanded their pro-gaming footprint even further, including competitive multiplayer online battle arena (MOBAs) games, such as League of Legends.
Contracted players can earn up to $2 million, excluding sponsorship. Their careers are brief, insomuch that one 26-year-old pro-player, Clinton Loomis is known as ‘Old Man Dota’, but glorious and their veneration almost god-like.
Last year, esports had a worldwide audience of $385m.
In Katowice, Poland, where the final of the Intel Extreme Masters - the Olympics of esports, if you will - was hosted this year, more than 170 000 fans pitched up to watch the event.
Tottenham Hotspur announced in May they will be hosting future esports events at ‘new’ White Hart Lane from next year, hoping to attract crowds of over 50 000.
Meanwhile, in Las Vegas, matches are being streamed in casinos.
The Luxor is currently constructing a dedicated arena to esports.
The prize money on offer for these events are staggering. The International, a Dota2 - another MOBA - tournament had a prize pool of close to $21m, with the winning team taking home a smidgen over $9m.
Revenue in 2016 for esports generated close to $890 million, according to market research, and is expected to exceed $1bn by 2019.
With such immense amounts of cash changing hands, the pressure to succeed is asphyxiating, revealing a darker side to competitive gaming that includes cheating, match-fixing and, as revealed by a Wired article earlier this week, the use of performance enhancing drugs, such as Adderall, to stay wired and combative.
Even here, despite the country’s socio-economic problems and it’s resource-heavy, hardware driven nature, esports has been given a foothold. SuperSport has begun streaming events on their DstvNow application as of May, and packaging highlight of CounterStrike for early morning consumption and airing The Bridge magazine show, on their sporting bouquet.
This weekend, they are the media sponsors for the VS Gaming Festival at Gallagher Estate, open to the public and the largest such event in Africa, where 1 024 gamers will compete in an e-Football tournament for prize money totalling R1.5 million.
If you still have some doubt concerning the digitising of sport and how serious this is all getting, here’s one last tasty morsel: The top 10 players at the VS event will receive a one-year professional esports contract from Orlando Pirates.