ESL are excited to announce the Groups for Season 9 of the Pro League, using the new format and LAN play. The new seeding system is based on the ESL World Ranking, which assigns points to teams based on their performance at events by also considering various factors of the event itself (number of teams, quality of teams, online and offline performance, and more).
The Groups:
Based off of this, the following groups were determined.
Europe
| Group A | Group B | Group C | Group D |
|---|---|---|---|
| mousesports | FaZe Clan | Natus Vincere | Astralis |
| North | Ninjas In Pyjamas | fnatic | BIG |
| OpTic Gaming | Heroic | G2 Esports | HellRaisers |
| ex Space Soldiers | devils.one | Windigo Gaming | 3DMAX |
Americas
| Group A | Group B | Group C | Group D |
|---|---|---|---|
| NRG Esports | Team Liquid | MIBR | Isurus Gaming |
| Renegades | Ghost Gaming | Cloud9 | Team FullSend |
| eUnited | compLexity Gaming | Team Envy | Team Jaguar |
| INTZ eSports | Swole Patrol | Rogue | Detona Gaming |
The teams were placed in the four different groups per region based on their ESL World Rank on January 9th. This date was chosen so as to give teams enough time before the season start to plan around any other events they'd want to attend. The next possible date to take the World Ranking as a basis, after the conclusion of the IEM Katowice Major, would have left the teams with only a month before the start of the season, and thus no chance to properly plan their schedule.
The ESL World Ranking (by January 9th)
#1 Astralis
#2 Team Liquid
#3 MIBR
#4 Natus Vincere
#5 mousesports
#6 NRG Esports
#7 FaZe Clan
#8 Ninjas in Pyjamas
#9 North
#10 fnatic
#11 BIG Clan
#12 Renegades
#13 HellRaisers
#14 Cloud9
#15 G2 Esports
#16 Ghost Gaming
#17 ENCE (not in Pro League)
#18 compLexity
#19 OpTic Gaming
#20 Team Envy
#21 Sharks Esports (not in Pro League)
#22 Team LDLC (not in Pro League)
#23 Luminosity (not in Pro League)
#24 Vega Squadron (not in Pro League)
#25 Virtus.pro (not in Pro League)
#26 eUnited
#27 Heroic
#28 Team Vitality (not in Pro League)
#29 Gambit Esports (not in Pro League)
#30 INTZ eSports
#31 TyLoo
#32 Avangar (not in Pro League)
#33 Rogue
#34 Vici Gaming
#35 ORDER (not in Pro League)
#36 Bravado Gaming (not in Pro League)
#37 devils.one
#38 ex Space Soldiers
#39 x6tence (not in Pro League)
#40 forZe (not in Pro League)
#41 Windigo Gaming
#42 Swole Patrol
More details on the group format will be announced next week.
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