Team ranking: August 2020
We have updated our Global team ranking — powered by EGB.com — for August 2020.
August marked the return to action after the player break, satisfying fans' craving for high-level Counter-Strike, though it's still in an online setting because of the global health situation. The first tournament series of the season, DreamHack Open Summer, was rather straightforward, as BIG and FURIA topped the two main regions, but the same cannot be said about ESL One Cologne, which was packed with surprises in Europe.
Heroic, who won the prestigious tournament after sweeping Vitality in the final, were one of the big winners of the month, regardless of the ban slapped on coach Nicolai "HUNDEN" Petersen for using the spectator bug earlier in the year. Evil Geniuses and Complexity also looked dominant during the first month after the break, while big names like FaZe, fnatic and MIBR showed no signs of figuring things out.
Here's a summary of our ranking for new readers:
Our team ranking is based on teams' achievements over the past year (with severe decay in points throughout each month), recent form over the last two months, and performance in recent events in the last 3 months.
Each team is required to have a three-man core in order to retain their points. Due to the ongoing coronavirus outbreak, online results, which previously had a minimal effect, now carry more weight as they are also included in the 'Achievements' and 'Recent Events' sub-categories.
Below is the current top 30 table as of September 7, which goes more in-depth into how the points are distributed — or you can check our special page, where you will be able to find the latest, weekly version of our ranking. You can see the lineup for each team by hovering over their name in the table.
POINTS
Please note that the +/- gain on this table differs from our weekly rankings page, and it is related to the ranking update of August 3.
Below are the key takeaways from August's ranking update:
Heroic reach new heights in bittersweet month
Heroic were the protagonists of one of the most touching Cinderella stories in the Counter-Strike scene in recent times as they won the European division of ESL One Cologne following an incredible playoff run that saw them beat Complexity, G2 and Vitality in convincing fashion. It was the culmination of the Danish team's hard work after they had shown steady progress in the months following their signing of Nikolaj "niko" Kristensen.
Heroic jumped nine places in the ranking, from 11th to second, following their Cologne victory, but the players barely had any time to enjoy their biggest feat ever: just 24 hours after the tournament, it was announced that coach HUNDEN had been suspended for 12 months due to using the spectator bug for competitive advantage.
ESL has guaranteed that Heroic's Cologne campaign was clean, but the effects of the scandal were immediately felt: the team lost their first two matches in ESL Pro League, against ENCE (No. 26) and AGO (No.57), and face a tall order to make it out of the groups in the tournament.
Tough times ahead for MIBR
MIBR's European adventure has been nothing short of a nightmare. After travelling to Serbia to compete in ESL One Cologne and step up preparations for the final quarter of the year by scrimming against different types of quality opponents on a regular basis, the Brazilians find themselves in crisis mode and ready to hit the panic button.
MIBR won just two of the ten matches that they played on European soil ahead of Monday's ranking update. Individual form isn't the only thing that seem to be getting in their way as the recent run of results led to a leadership change, with Vito "kNgV-" Giuseppe having taking over as in-game leader.
After such a dreadful month that also saw their coach, Ricardo "dead" Sinigaglia, slapped with a six-month ban for using the spectator bug, the Brazilians can count themselves lucky to have moved down just five spots in the rankings. But the worst is yet to come: having decided to skip the ESL Pro League, they are likely to continue their drop in the rankings in the coming weeks, and who knows where they'll be by the time IEM New York kicks off. It may be a while before we see MIBR anywhere near the top 20 again.
Evil Geniuses breathing down Vitality’s neck
After dipping down to No. 12 in the rankings following 7-8th place finishes in ESL One: Road to Rio - North America and DreamHack Masters Spring midway through last season, Evil Geniuses have since gone in crescendo and capitalized on the struggles of the rest of the field to become the dominant force in the region. EG won the last two events before going on vacation, BLAST Premier Spring Americas Finals and cs_summit 6 North America, the latter while lost just one map in five matches, including the best-of-five title decider.
Evil Geniuses did not show any signs of slowing down after returning to competition as they made it three tournament wins in a row after topping ESL One Cologne, though this time around they were made to work hard to beat the new-look Liquid in the final, which went the full distance.
Sitting a mere 42 points below Vitality, whom they climbed the ranking ladder with back in June, Evil Geniuses are charging full speed ahead as they have already won two straightforward series against 100 Thieves and Cloud9 in their first ESL Pro League Season 12 North America matches. Vitality are still at the top and proving to be a title contender as they showed with their ESL One Cologne Europe second place, but Evil Geniuses are low in the grass waiting to pounce and steal the top spot in the rankings in case the French team slip up in the more competitive of the two regions.
Pressure mounts on FaZe and fnatic
Both FaZe and fnatic have suffered steep drops since last month’s ranking update following mixed performances in ESL One Cologne and in the ESL Pro League. After going into the player break just outside the top-five, FaZe lost points by replacing Aurimas "Bymas" Pipiras with Markus "Kjaerbye" Kjærbye, and their failure to hit the ground running with the Dane has not helped the team's efforts. Their current rank of 14th is their lowest this year, and the 0-2 start to their Pro League campaign isn't exactly encouraging after the team dropped out of Cologne in 9th-12th place, though there is the caveat that they were defeated by the eventual finalists, Heroic and Vitality.
fnatic’s drop is similar, going from No. 7 at the beginning of last month, one place behind FaZe, to No. 13 this month, one position above Janko "YNk" Paunović’s men. The Swedes' strong end to 2019 and promising start to 2020 have given way to mediocre results throughout the current online era, with no top-four finishes since the victory in ESL Pro League Season 11 Europe. With their good results starting to fade into the background, fnatic's poor form and recent results are starting to put a damper on their ranking numbers. Like FaZe, the Swedish team came in 9-12th at ESL One Cologne, only beating Heretics, and have endured a tepid start to their ESL Pro League campaign, beating Spirit but losing to MOUZ.
BIG pay the price for ESL One Cologne slip-up
BIG made headlines in early July as they made it to the top of the rankings after winning DreamHack Masters Spring and cs_summit 6 with a streak of strong performances. The German squad followed that up by winning DreamHack Open Summer, their first event of the new season, but then dropped off when it mattered the most, ESL One Cologne.
An opening match against Sprout seemed like a mere formality for the then-No. 1 team in the world, but the derby ended up going the way of the underdogs, who had warned of the online nature of the match. Down in the lower bracket, BIG had to face Ninjas in Pyjamas in a complicated elimination match that went the way of the Swedes, who won a map with 24 rounds of overtime to stay alive in the series before eliminating Tobias "tow b" Herberhold’s men in the decider.
Despite the early ESL One Cologne exit, BIG still hold onto 795 points in the rankings, which keeps the team in the top-five for the foreseeable future. The German squad currently hold a 2-1 record in ESL Pro League, a competition that could be crucial for their hopes of remaining among the elite teams in the table.
Lucas Aznar Miles contributed to this story.
Chris 'chrisJ' de Jong
David 'frozen' Čerňanský
Robin 'ropz' Kool
Aurimas 'Bymas' Pipiras
Joakim 'jkaem' Myrbostad
Sean 'Gratisfaction' Kaiwai
Edgar 'MarKE' Maldonado
Jonathan 'Jonji' Carey
Mario 'malbsMd' Samayoa
Aran 'Sonic' Groesbeek
Tsvetelin 'CeRq' Dimitrov
Viktor 'sdy' Orudzhev
Nemanja 'huNter-' Kovač
Nemanja 'nexa' Isaković
Pavle 'Maden' Bošković
Hansel 'BnTeT' Ferdinand
Nicolas 'Keoz' Dgus
Ismailcan 'XANTARES' Dörtkardeş
Issa 'ISSAA' Murad
Helvijs 'broky' Saukants
Nicolai 'HUNDEN' Petersen
Jamie 'keita' Hall
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