STAGE ONE

STAGE ONE REVIEW:

In recent tournaments, Stage One has seldom been the domain of great shocks, however, the Ninth Mega Drive Tournament was different. Gone were the traditional groups and instead members vied for position using the Swiss scoring method, which, basically, pits winners against winners and losers against losers. With six games played; Alien Storm, Streets of Rage 3, Mutant League Hockey, FIFA '96, Sensible Soccer and Sonic 3, there was ample opportunity for each player to show their quality. While João Pires gave the best performance of the First Stage, with five wins from his six games, the focus was perhaps more on who failed to qualify as opposed to who progressed to the Second Stage. The much-feared Fátima Campos drastically under performed and ended up ranked twelfth. Orlando Silva, a colossus of early tournaments, slipped even further down the rankings. Hugo Vieira who has been on the cusp of Stage Three for the past few competitions and Nuno Folhadela, who won just one game of the six, were all premature causalities. Of the three men who bought victory to Portugal at the 2008 European Mega Drive Championship, Alberto Campos finished joint second with Dário Pelixo while Ferdinand Menéndez only just scraped through to Stage Two after beating newcomer Pedro Bragança in a tiebreak game. Defending Champion and fan's favourite, Arsénio Ferraz, also qualified for the Second Phase of the competition.

STAGE TWO

STAGE TWO REVIEW:

Stage Two was a different beast entirely, relative to past Mega Drive tournaments. For the first time in the history of Portugal domestic Mega Drive competitions, team games were introduced, a novel concept where both participants are still battling against each other for league position. Players duelled on Eternal Champions, General Chaos, Micro Machines '96 and WWF Raw. Shocks came think and fast with the expected best teams losing on Eternal Champions, followed by João Pires and Dário Pelixo failing to makeup for failings of their team-mates in General Chaos and suffering defeats as a consequence, before two very one sided encounters on Micro Machines '96. Tactics played a decisive roll in the final group standings. With both Ferdinand Menéndez and Luis Xavier qualified by the time the contest reached the last game of the round: an all Vs all brawl on WWF Raw, they strategically upset the balance of power, so that they would be up against perceived weaker opponents in Stage Three. While this turned the tide against the more established members like Alberto Campos, Dário Pelixo and David Magueijo it opened the door for defending champion Arsénio Ferraz and newcomer Pedro Mendes to reach the final four.

STAGE THREE

STAGE THREE REVIEW:

While defending champion, Arsénio Ferraz, and newcomer, Pedro Mendes, had been granted an opportunity to battle in the Semi-Finals, due to strategic play from Ferdinand Menéndez and Luis Xavier in the proceeding round, these were the four men who would now go head-to-head for the opportunity of becoming the tournament victor! Both Arsénio and Ferdinand had particpated in Stage Three in previous tournaments. For Arsénio there was the chance that he would be the first man to successfully defend his title since Jorge Esteves at the Third Mega Drive Tournament. For Ferdinand he had the opportunity to surpass his previous best performance achieved at the Sixth Tournament when he was eliminated by David Magueijo in a tight World Cup Italia '90 final. Yet Arsénio's dreams were undone by Luis Xavier, a rookie in the final phase, who outraced Arsénio on the Virtua Racing expert course to finish almost a lap a head. The other semi-final race between Pedro and Ferdinand was much, much tighter and it was Ferdinand who stole victory by a matter of seconds. So began the Herzog Zwei final between Ferdinand Menéndez and Luis Xavier. From the offing it was pretty clear who was going to win, as Ferdinand's offensive game play was no match for Luis Xavier who faded into defeat. With victory in the final, Ferdinand Menéndez became the Champion of Portugal as well as Champion of Europe!