ESL reveals IEM Katowice invites

18-1-2018 17:42

ESL has revealed the list of teams who have been invited to compete at IEM Katowice and in the closed qualifiers in Europe and North America.

Without surprise, the current top 6 teams in the world plus home crowd favourites Virtus.pro take up seven of the eight invite spots, with the final team being determined by UCC's Farmskins Championship #2, which is currently underway.

Europe will have four qualifying slots, while North America has been allocated two. Oceania and Asia will both have one qualifying spot at the main event.

SK among the teams invited to attend the $500,000 IEM Katowice

The following teams have been invited to IEM Katowice:

SK	Astralis
Virtus.pro	FaZe
Cloud9	Ninjas in Pyjamas
G2	UCC tournament winner

With the invites for the Oceanic and the Asian qualifiers already out, ESL has now revealed the names of the teams who have been invited to the European and the North American closed qualifiers. The list looks as follows:

Europe (February 3-4)	North America (January 30)
Gambit	Renegades
fnatic	OpTic
North	Liquid
MOUZ	100 Thieves
BIG	NRG
HellRaisers	Luminosity
Natus Vincere	Misfits
Envy

IEM Katowice will span six days and culminate with the playoffs at the Spodek Arena, in Katowice, from March 2-4. A total of $500,000 will be up for grabs in the tournament, which will be played under the new format announced by ESL last month, with two double-elimination groups of eight teams leading to the playoffs.

nice they invited top 6 teams, +vp?? why edit : YES I KNOW THAT IT IS IN POLAND AND THAT IS WHY VP GOT INV

2018-01-18 17:45

53 replies

good for nip vp though smh

2018-01-18 17:43

33 replies

does it matter anymore? no one gonna watch this shit

18 replies

facebook LUL

2018-01-18 17:44

11 replies

nip vp and c9 wasted slots

2018-01-18 17:46

8 replies

EZ for farmskins championship #2 winner tbh

2018-01-18 17:50

Why c9? They qualified for the Major.

2018-01-18 17:54

Stop bullshitting about c9 they deserves this invite rn,dunno about VP and NiP,mb its better to put them in closed quals,but who should take the 2 free slots?Fnatic?May be.Gambit,Na'Vi,North?!!Hell no,dawg!!!

3 replies

why should anyone get a free slot?

2018-01-18 18:02

2 replies

"ESL REVEALS IEM KATOWICE INVITES",their choise to invite 7 team,not my,so why you asking me about this?

2018-01-18 18:04

1 reply

you're asking me who should get free slots, I say no one should get free slots.

2018-01-18 18:05

yes...nip only won the last IEM xP

2018-01-18 18:10

Nip > most sub top +10 teams

2018-01-27 15:08

ESL One is on fb. This is IEM so I think it’s gonna be twitch.

2018-01-18 18:08

I believe iem tournaments wont be broadcasted on facebook only epl and esl one

2018-01-18 18:09

This is still on twitch

2018-01-18 17:48

5 replies

rly?

4 replies

Yes only epl and esl one are affected

o i forgot

2018-01-18 17:55

thank mr iem

2018-01-18 18:00

2018-01-18 21:29

wow, inviting vp and nip, but not mouz ???

7 replies

Because it's polish event?

lol assuming vp will do anything in the event?

Can u predict top 20 hltv 2018?

2018-01-18 17:47

U said same at Epicenter and they almost won the whole tournament

VP to major grand final but may not beat sk. Will be 2-1 either way.

2018-01-18 17:51

i said same at epicenter??? what.

2018-01-18 18:28

NiP are still top 4, chokesports would just bomb out

2018-01-18 18:32

NiP shouldn't be invited :( Not even real top4

2018-01-18 17:49

So tell me what g2 has done past 4 or even more months. Let me tell you nothing

NiP been good for what ? 1.5 month, aka 1 tournament. G2 got good from lineup formation till end of October. + More T1 tournaments wins

And they still haven't done anything since then.

2018-01-18 18:33

And NiP still done nothing else since 2 years At least G2 qualified for major and major qualifier

2018-01-19 06:32

I think NiP's invite is justified by the fact that they won the last IEM event (Oakland).

2018-01-18 19:52

how can you not invite VP for IEM Katowice? braindead?

yeah ik that it is for the crowd but they wont make it out of groups anyways, mouz or fnatic should have gotten the invite

Finally someone who follows the logic.

2018-01-18 17:53

VP FOR FANS LUL

So they invited top 7 teams

Top 6 + vp...

2018-01-23 15:30

They invited nip also

well it's an event in Poland so it would be a disgrace if they had one of the largest events in a country without inviting any team from it.

Maybe bc polish event :thinking:

because it's in Poland?

are you stupid or pretending to be stupid?

VP top 3 team of the major :P

poland or not VP has a lot of fans and will bring more viewership

If it's on Facebook VP fans will be the only ones watching so true. Have a cool day! -VeryCoolGuy

2018-01-18 18:44

How gambit not invited

Why did nip get invited too anyways? They were shit the whole year and only had one good tournament

And that tournament were iem xd

2018-01-19 07:38

NiP top 4 H@H@H@H@H@H@H@H@H@H@

2018-01-18 18:43

Nice

2018-01-18 17:42

Neat!

ffs internet explorer smh

okay

SDJFLKSDFJsdaf

DAMMIT

NIP :)

GL NiP!

GG C9

GO 100T

I only see 5 thives tho

100 br

VP xD. Good one.

VP omegalul

ez win for C9

NIP PogChamp ez 4 f0rest as usual

Where is mouz?

10 replies

in the online quals prolly xD

9 replies

-NiP -VP +mouz +Liquid

lol what did Liquid and mouz do to be invited? ayy

What did VP do to be invited?

6 replies

Rhey are from poland Katowice is in poland

first of all, vp are from Poland so it's obvious they will be invited instead of mouz and Liquid second of all, please do not make me compare VP's achievements in 2017 with mouz's and Liquid's xD

2018-01-18 17:59

gyazo.com/f2ced7736a5c709343ec19af125af8..

that's only last 3 months VP haven't played anything since WESG in November mouz played at ECS and difference between 7th and 10th is only 90pts so don't be too cocky xD

mouz played final at ECS which they almost rekt FaZe in and won an tier 1 event* Your argument is that VP didn't even play much.. well LUL you counter argumented yourself

? they didn't play that much thus they're only 10th in the ranking well, almost but they didn't vp on the other hand won against FaZe and almost won a tier1 event (epicenter)

2018-01-18 18:15

NiP? LUL

Well IEM was always made of stations. Every winner from each station has guaranteed spot in finals and finals are held in Katowice everyear. So NiP as winners of Station Oakland got their spot in Katowice. We can argue if they are tier one or 2, but with no doubt they deserve the spot as the winners of IEM Oakland (which was tier 1 event tho)

2018-01-19 14:54

next vega pls

WHERE'S THE MAJOR VIEWER'S GUIDE?!?!??!

at IEM Katowice at in the closed qualifiers across four regions.

Niceee.

Easy for G2 tho

IZZI VILA MIX

G2G2G2G2G2G2

if Gambit wins Major I expect them to invite my team

A lightning doesn't strike the same place twice my friend

Hahaha, nice 1 Xdd

2018-01-18 17:56

If you search google for "can lightning strike twice" you get this result: "TRUTH: The old saying that 'lightning never strikes the same place twice' is another myth that any veteran storm observer or researcher has seen nature defy. Lightning can strike any location more than once. In fact, given enough time, it is actually inevitable." If you don't agree with this statement then keep reading next 100 results... my friend :)

2018-01-18 21:03

EZ FOR R-EZ and gud f0rest.

GG VP LOL

No mouz:(

SK <3

where is fnatic?

Niceeee #GoGoVP

ez for SK gaming once again

why the fuck is nip going before fnatic???? LOL bullshit.

bc NiP wouldn´t qualify

I really dislike NiP and their fans, but how many IEMs, ProLeagues or ESL Ones have fnatic won in the last year?

NIP more fans and popularity

lel The fnatic brand actually has 2X more fans than NIP but its expected from a gt fan

2018-01-18 21:27

Nice to see vp and nip invited. Crowd favorites.

no ago but hr ok nice

AGO can easily qualify via this online cup that gives a spot. No need to invite them in 2 qualifiers.

Where's Vega?

VAMOS 100 THIEVES!

so Optic is staying in NA? ;o

Well, else they would never qualify for anything.

Nice, but in Facebook nope.

No faceshit for iem

Ok, because Facebook in stream is shit.

not biased at all to invite tier 2 vp lol

no one is gonna watch anyways thanks to the facebool deal LUL

and STOP inviting virtus.pro!

What about Liquid?

Nip and VP PogChamp

Ez for en ai pe. Also for people fuming over VP invite, chill, organizers always invite local teams because they will draw huge crowds.

Inviting HR sh1tvyus ABD BUG CLAN but no spaceS xD

EZ VP

Optic with full European lineup in NA qualifier LOGIC

no one cares because of facebook

The LAN tournaments will still be streamed on twitch. Like how before Pro League was on YouTube but tournaments were on Twitch.

2018-01-18 19:02

Invite enyvus but no spaces hahahahaha lul xd fuck off

invinting NiP in 2018 L U L

inviting envyus instead of ss LUL

2018-01-18 17:57

Invite HR and Envyus but no SS. This is fucking joke. I have nothing against HR and Envyus but it is clear that SS better than currently.

+1 I think they deserved but what can I say..

2018-01-18 19:28

#AGO_TO_IEM

Why no ss?

2018-01-18 18:01

nice

2018-01-18 18:11

Shit NV gets invite but SS has NOT. W T F

2018-01-18 18:13

VP and NiP got invited even though they play good once an year, why is that? Because brand mate, EnVy is a much bigger brand than SS even though their team sucks cock, they will still invite. It's just the way it works, until recently no one really invited gambit even after they beat T1 teams because the brand isn't as big as VP or NiP.

2018-01-18 18:59

Dude you are right , ok

2018-01-18 19:10

Let's see what 100T can do

2018-01-18 18:21

Tbh inviting vp and nip is wasting of spots..

2018-01-18 18:29

VP invite = trash invite

vp wasted spot

2018-01-18 18:36

-VP +AGO No joke, rather have a T2 team than a twice an year T1 but rest of year T5 team.

2018-01-18 19:01

yep this is good idea to see AGO than those overrated legends

This tournament will be awesomeeeee <3

2018-01-18 18:47

Im so happy to see that it is double elimination - Ive been waiting to see a double elim tournament in csgo for a long long time Also gl to VP youll need it

2018-01-18 19:23

ez 100 Thieves

2018-01-18 19:24

EZ Misfits

2018-01-18 19:33

a shit team from the UCC will come to this but in europe teams like NaVi, Gambit, Fnatic, North, mouz have to play in a much harder qualifieer ... woooow

2018-01-18 19:41