Team ranking: May 2020

We have updated our Global team ranking - powered by EGB.com - for May 2020, another month featuring solely online play.

Players and fans alike have already gotten accustomed to the world of online play, which has taken centre stage again due to the coronavirus pandemic. After the ESL Pro League and Flashpoint came to an end in April, the first Regional Major Ranking event — ESL One: Road to Rio — was the main talking point of May as some of the best teams in the world faced off for qualifying points for the 2020 Counter-Strike Major.

The biggest driving force in ranking shifts last month was the Road to Rio event — won by Astralis in Europe, Spirit in CIS, Gen.G in North America, and BOOM in South America — with the group stage of DreamHack Masters Spring and smaller tournaments, such as Home Sweet Home cups, playing a smaller part.

Changes in Astralis shook up the rankings

Putting aside tournaments and match results, a big wave in the rankings was caused by the highest-ranked team at the start of the month, Astralis, making two roster changes and losing a number of points because of it. Due to the relative nature of the ranking system, teams below them also gained a significant number of points, leading to a very congested top five.

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 June 1, 2020, 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.

Counter-Strike World ranking on June 1st, 2020

RANK

TEAM

ACHV

FORM

LAN

TOTAL
POINTS

+/-

1.

Natus Vincere

500

74

300

874

+2

2.

Astralis

447

190

180

817

-1

3.

fnatic

467

128

219

814

-1

4.

G2

400

146

229

775

+2

5.

MOUZ

497

99

166

762

-1

6.

Liquid

402

94

140

636

-1

7.

FaZe

235

200

120

555

-

8.

FURIA

162

190

81

433

+3

9.

Evil Geniuses

305

55

54

414

-1

10.

Vitality

211

135

58

404

-1

11.

100 Thieves

211

83

88

382

-1

12.

Ninjas in Pyjamas

128

141

51

320

+1

13.

Spirit

74

190

47

311

+6

14.

Gen.G

106

97

78

281

+9

15.

MAD Lions

107

97

73

277

-3

16.

Cloud9

74

150

34

258

+4

17.

Complexity

46

169

36

251

+9

18.

MIBR

99

84

28

211

-4

19.

GODSENT

73

81

54

208

-2

20.

BIG

38

153

16

207

-4

21.

ENCE

72

117

14

203

-

22.

OG

83

53

64

200

-7

23.

Heretics

37

114

48

199

+7

24.

North

51

99

30

180

+1

25.

FORZE

76

83

19

178

-7

26.

Virtus.pro

78

71

27

176

-4

27.

HEROIC

40

114

4

158

-

28.

Winstrike

35

65

46

146

+5

29.

Hard Legion

29

84

32

145

+21

30.

Movistar Riders

23

93

25

141

+10

Please note that the +/- gain on this table differs from our weekly rankings page, and it is related to the ranking update of May 4.

Below are the four key takeaways from May's ranking update:

Astralis' loss is NAVI's gain

Natus Vincere return to the top of the world rankings after taking advantage of what has been a period of turmoil for Astralis, who are down to 3/5 of their main lineup after Lukas "⁠gla1ve⁠" Rossander and Andreas "⁠Xyp9x⁠" Højsleth requested some time off to recover from burnout.

The loss of two players cost Astralis a fair chunk of points despite the Danes still enjoying success in May as they won ESL One Road to Rio, losing just one match in ten series and dropping only five maps in the process, which was quite a remarkable achievement for a squad running on fumes.

NAVI back to No.1 at Astralis' expense

The next few weeks won't be easy for Astralis, who have fnatic, G2 and MOUZ breathing down their necks and are left with the task of building a team on the fly with two tournaments already underway. The No.1 spot belongs to NAVI for now, but their worrisome form (74 points, the second-lowest in the top 20) is seeing their closest suitors rub their hands with glee.

FURIA aim for No.1 spot in North America

Ever since Counter-Strike moved exclusively to the online realm, the top 10-12 teams have been pretty much unchanged — swaps have happened within the best squads, but no outsider has been able to make big enough strides to actually break through. FURIA is looking to be the only exception of the online era as consistently good results have seen them climb to eighth in the world.

Andrei "⁠arT⁠" Piovezan's men first showed promise in ESL Pro League Season 11 North America, finishing third behind Evil Geniuses and Liquid before outplacing both North American powerhouses in the following ESL One: Road to Rio. FURIA reached the grand final of the event without sustaining a loss — beating Liquid twice on their way there — but suffered an upset loss to Gen.G and had to settle for second place. Finally, in DreamHack Masters Spring, the Brazilians made clear that they are looking to challenge Liquid by securing their third win of the month over Jonathan "⁠EliGE⁠" Jablonowski and co., as well as topping their group.

Could a Brazilian team sit on top of NA again?

After overtaking Evil Geniuses and showing that they can deal with Liquid in head-to-head matchups, FURIA seem like a legitimate contender for the title of the best team in North America. The point gap is still significant, but with Kaike "⁠KSCERATO⁠" Cerato, Yuri "⁠yuurih⁠" Santos, and Henrique "⁠HEN1⁠" Teles all showing great form (1.15+ ratings over the last three months) and a lot of Counter-Strike to be played before the break, we could once again see South Americans reign supreme over their northern counterparts.

Spirit edge closer to top 10

We had already outlined Spirit's rise at the start of May when the Russian squad managed to break into the top-20 following a number of BO3 upsets in cups, qualifiers, and ESL Pro League, and Leonid "⁠chopper⁠" Vishnyakov's men have continued to impress, climbing six more spots and edging closer to the top 10 at the start of June.

Spirit have enjoyed a rapid rise through the ranks

Their first big achievement was winning the ESL One: Road to Rio - CIS, in which Spirit chained seven BO3 victories in a row, taking advantage of Natus Vincere's group stage slip-up and showing dominance over other regional teams, such as FORZE, Virtus.pro, and Winstrike. Adding to that, Spirit also secured a playoff spot in DreamHack Masters Spring, in which they claimed a top-five scalp by 2-0'ing fnatic, and they realistically could've topped the group considering their only loss was from a thriller series with FaZe - which they partially played without Nikolay "⁠mir⁠" Bityukov due to technical issues.

The 24-year-old rifler has been a steady performer for Spirit since the roster was assembled, but his incredible form in the last month is worth highlighting as it has been nothing short of sensational. With a 1.37 rating across 32 maps played, including a series-high 1.41 rating in the deciding match against GODSENT, mir is finally starting to look like the player who helped Vega Squadron break out back in 2017, and he will be key to Spirit's further development as the team continue to make history.

The grind pays off for Complexity

Complexity are making the most of their time in Europe, despite results not always going their way. After getting dangerously close to exiting the top 30 in April's monthly ranking, the international team moved up nine spots after a busy month that saw them play 48 official maps.

Benjamin "⁠blameF⁠" Bremer's troops placed second in a tough DreamHack Masters Spring group that also included MOUZ, BIG and MAD Lions, and won three different editions of the Home Sweet Home Cup, picking up 113 points in the "form" sub-category, in which they currently are currently ranked fifth.

Complexity have the fifth-most form points after a very busy month

The grind will continue for Complexity in June: they will have the chance to prove that their recent uptick in form isn't a mirage as they will face quality opposition in the DreamHack Masters Spring playoffs and in the BLAST Premier Spring 2020 Europe Finals. Meanwhile, they will be eyeing their fourth Home Sweet Home Cup title as they will be taking part in the seventh edition of the $40,000 online tournament.