ESL Pro League Season 14

Lore & Background

The ESL Pro League is a Counter-Strike: Global Offensive league, organized by German esports company ESL. Season 13 concluded on April 11, 2021, with Danish team Heroic beating Russian team Gambit 2–3. The qualification period started immediately after, with initial plans for the season to be played on-sight in Malta, ESL announced on July 20, that all matches would be played online from Europe. Initially planned to be a LAN-tournament, with the matches being played in Malta, the season was like the previous three seasons played online, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The group stage of the season used the round-robin format; all teams in a group had to play once against each other in best-of-three matches. Each win gave a team three, each loss zero points. On July 27, ESL announced that the format of the tournament would change, removing the two play-off matches between the group's winner. Instead, the group's best-performing team would immediately advance to the quarterfinals, with the each group's second and third to play another match, to get the four last quarter finalist. According to ESL, the system was changed due to "feedback gathered from the community and in agreement with the teams and players".

In Their Own Story

The server ping read 12 ms. s1mple cracked his knuckles, the blue glow of his monitor painting the small apartment in Kyiv. No crowd. No arena. Just the dry click of a mechanical keyboard and the distant sound of rain against a window. His teammates were scattered across Europe, each in their own quiet room, each breathing the same tense silence before the first round load. The ESL Pro League bracket glowed on the second monitor. One more map, and the season would be over. He exhaled, rolled his wrists, and whispered a word in Ukrainian that his teammates had learned to recognize as the sound of a man about to erase a round from existence. The bomb ticked. The world held its breath in a hundred separate rooms, all watching the same screen.

Reader's Guide

Map pool: Dust 2, Mirage, Inferno, Overpass, Nuke, Vertigo, Ancient. Teams competing: Like the previous season, 24 teams competed in the tournament. Twelve of those are permanent partners of ESL, therefore being invited directly to the season. Seven more teams were chosen by ESL, based on their positions on the company's CS:GO World Ranking. The five final teams qualified through tournaments held by ESL's partner, ESEA. Renegades qualified for the season in a one-off Oceania playoff against the team Order, winning 3–1 on June 29. However, on August 11, Renegades announced that they would not participate, citing travel restrictions due to the ongoing pandemic. Joshua "INS" Potter said in a video released via Twitter that "Unfortunately, due to the global pandemic right now, we will be unable to attend ESL Pro League". ESL replaced Renegades with the Russian team forZe. Bad News Bear and TeamOne qualified via winning the ESEA Premier Season 36 and 37 North America, respectively. Sinners qualified on June 27, winning the 37th Season of ESEA Premier, scoring 2–0 against Polish team AGO, making Sinners the first Czech team to play in the EPL. Group stage: The group stage was divided into four groups each with six teams. Based on the tournament format, each team had to play five best-of-three matches. A win would be awarded with three points, a loss with zero. The group's best performing team would immediately advance to the quarterfinals, the second and third place had to play another best-of-three match in the round of twelve. Heroic and OG both won their groups without a single loss.

Did You Know?

• Natus Vincere won the league for the first time, beating Vitality 3–2 in the final.
• Navi received US$195,000 of the prize pool and an additional US$1,000,000 by completing the Intel Grand Slam.
• Navi's Aleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev was named the MVP.
• The season was played online due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Sinners became the first Czech team to play in the EPL.