ESL announce complete team list for IEM Katowice Play-In stage

23-12-2021 01:04

Entropiq, fnatic, Extra Salt, and Copenhagen Flames are among the final set of teams to secure spots at the event.

The complete team list for IEM Katowice 2022 has been announced following the conclusion of the last Big Event of the year, with the last adjustments to the ESL World Ranking on Monday determining the final set of eight teams that will attend the Play-In stage.

Among those that secured the final invites to the initial 16-team phase of the tournament are fnatic, who have been steadily climbing the rankings and showcasing strong form ever since the addition of Owen "⁠smooya⁠" Butterfield.

Copenhagen Flames, who impressed with a dark horse run at PGL Major Stockholm but have struggled to maintain momentum since returning to online play, are also through to the Play-In stage, where they'll hope to demonstrate that their Major results weren't a one-off.

Entropiq are the sole CIS team in the Play-In stage

Also among the teams invited from Europe are ENCE, BIG, and OG, with the latter two teams being linked to roster changes heading into the new year, with OG in particular suffering a heavy blow should the reported move of Aleksi "⁠Aleksib⁠" Virolainen to G2 come to fruition.

Entropiq, meanwhile, picked up the sole CIS invite as the highest-ranked team in the region outside of Natus Vincere, Virtus.pro, and Gambit, who are all qualified directly to the main event.

The final spot in the Play-In stage was earned by Extra Salt, who are the only other North American team alongside Liquid set to attend the event. The core of the team were recently linked with a possible move to Complexity in 2022, leaving the question of whether the players would carry over the slot to the organization with a roster majority if the transfer is realized.

Sources: Complexity in talks to sign Extra Salt trio; add Grim, junior

IEM Katowice's Play-In stage will kick off on February 15, from which eight teams will advance to the main event to meet another eight invited sides. The complete list of teams that will attend the tournament looks as follows:

Main Event

Play-In

My team not there?! Wtf?!

2021-12-23 01:05

12 replies

2021-12-23 01:07

2 replies

2021-12-23 02:29

1 reply

umm

2021-12-23 08:06

what is the difference of ESL World Ranking and ESL Road-to-Katowice ranking??

2021-12-23 02:39

6 replies

ESL Road to Kato/Cologne (also called ESL Pro Tour rankings) only takes into account the major ESL events in the 6 months before the event (for a 100% points) and for the other 6 months before that for 50% and only grants invites for Kato/Cologne. The ESL World Ranking tries (usually fails pretty bad, but still) to be an objective World Ranking and tries to compete with HLTV rankings. It takes into accounts all T1-2 and a lot of T3 events, grants invites into most ESL events and is used for seeding in all of them

2021-12-23 03:22

5 replies

rare to see someone as helpful as you on this website. well done mens))

2021-12-23 12:33

2021-12-23 13:30

2021-12-23 13:31

nice thx for info :)

2021-12-23 19:00

You're welcome mens

2021-12-23 19:37

who?

2021-12-23 04:56

Your team?

2021-12-23 07:42

So quick!

ez 4 tyloo

2021-12-23 01:35

2021-12-23 02:55

Are they still in EU rn?

2021-12-23 06:03

no they already lost a semi final to Vici few days ago

2021-12-23 09:06

+111

2021-12-23 08:23

1 more OCE slot pls

2021-12-23 01:06

9 replies

Bruh

2021-12-23 01:44

1 is already too much

2021-12-23 01:52

ok, i will fix it bro (my father is steve job)

2021-12-23 02:06

for who bro lookingfororg? order?

2021-12-23 06:05

3 replies

-Renegades +LFO Justice for my boys

2021-12-23 08:01

lookingfororg havent exactly shown themselves in tier 1 before though so we shall see

2021-12-23 08:17

because there is usually only 1 invite for OCE and it always goes to Renegades or if there is a qualifier, Renegades wins it - which is why there should be 2 qualifier spots as I believe there is potential for the other OCE teams especially LFO & ORDER to do some damage against international opponents but never can.

2021-12-23 21:56

-oceania slot -asia slot ESL pls

2021-12-23 07:31

oceania scene used to be a lot better before pandemic

Ez4godsent

I hope lol

2021-12-25 00:23

ez4fnc

Extra Salt pog

8 replies

I pray

2021-12-23 06:07

ikr hopefully complexity soon though fingers crossed, fuck cphf

Ok but lets assume: oSee ---> Liquid. which means junior ---> Extra Salt Then FaNg, floppy, JT ---> Complexity That means Sonic, MarKE, and junior on ES... Since the core of ES goes to CoL, what happens to ES' spot? Do they keep their spot in Katowice despite having the core of their roster gone? Or does Complexity replace their spot?

2021-12-23 06:27

it will be the core from the original extra salt that gets the invite of course (so coL will get the spot), thats usually how it works, and complexity will probably sign junior from extra salt as well bro at least i hope so, the hypothetical team with pit beast grim sounds pog

2021-12-23 06:46

4 replies

Same. floppy / FaNg + Grim could be a nutty ass duo (or even trio)

still kinda doubtful of JT at tier 1 but we shall see what comes about

2021-12-23 06:47

I think JT has proved himelf as a competent IGL, he might not be able to compete as well against t1 but he's proved himself against t2 I feel like. He has also stepped up on the fragging department, he is underrated imo but yeah, the more he plays against t1 the more experience he will get to become better

2021-12-23 06:48

of course and yeah, he definitely has the frags too, kinda reminds me of dexter lets go african cs

2021-12-23 06:52

G2 vs Na' Vi Finals again mark my words

2021-12-23 01:09

Ok r4erjwageuchavdidixuchsbsucucuajsjchvinonpjsbeuf1234

2021-12-23 09:07

Should be ez for Wisla btw. wrong nip twitter account tagged by ESL xd

2021-12-23 01:11

true

2021-12-23 01:12

NIPGamingJP sounds like some hentai game developer

2021-12-23 01:34

Exited to see how fnatic are gonna show off vs tier 1 teams, cant wait to cheer on them

they almost 2-0ed Gambit if it wasnt for loosing soo many goddamn crucial clutches to Shiro on first map which was Inferno! got fucked on the 3rd map though

Even Liquid got fucked on overpass almost by same score, even though liquid were kings of overpass. Seems Only Navi can beat Gambit on Overpass rn

2021-12-23 13:03

yea seems to be that way

2021-12-23 16:45

go falmes

2021-12-23 01:16

2021-12-23 01:36

lol

2021-12-23 01:45

kek

2021-12-23 05:41

xDD n1

2021-12-23 11:39

hahahahah

2021-12-23 12:15

believe there was meddling

2021-12-23 19:35

EZ for fanatic

2021-12-23 01:18

EZ4FURIA LETS GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

2021-12-23 01:31

Anyone know is this is going to be Lan or not?

Its lan

For now

2021-12-23 01:38

Okay, ty you German sir

2021-12-23 01:43

Why german

2021-12-23 01:59

EZ 4 ES

2021-12-23 01:37

Still shambles that Furia and Liquid was offered a direct invite and not NIP

11 replies

Furia just better than NIP.

2021-12-23 01:51

Yeah, especially when they didn't qualify for any big event for like 2 months

2021-12-23 02:21

they didnt play since major, they dont want. They are looking for 5o player

2021-12-23 03:32

I think it was by regions, 3 slots for EU and CIS, 2 for NA. From EU u have g2/vitality/heroic - all these teams did better than nip, idk if they gave invites by some ranking or it was their personal decision.

2021-12-23 01:58

It's probably based off the ESL ranking and you are probably right.

2021-12-23 02:22

I checked that - It's not about esl ranking cuz NIP is above heroic.

Pro tour rankings determined the invites

2021-12-23 10:44

Is NiP really that much better then Liquid or Furia? Like significantly better? Cause as far as I can tell NiP for a team that is built to win now is about the most disappointing team in europe.

2021-12-23 05:04

Yes, they bought out Dev1ce but that left them with no cash for support player. They used Ztr/Lnz for a long time. When they finally get a better player, in e3tag, Device goes AFK. I think the org has bigger dreams but being two steps after Navi and one step after G2/Gambit/Vitality is reasonable. Last tournament looked a step up (with Phzy on awp) with close losses against G2/Astralis. So, as answer to your question, no they are currently not better than Liquid but they have potential to lift with some stability.

2021-12-23 09:39

Being the most dissapointing team in europe is still better than Furia who can't even win in NA.

2021-12-23 12:14

Yea, can somebody explain this? I think region should have zero influence. The best teams should qualify. NIP nr 5 in the world. Makes no sense. Many Therese a logical reason for it, how they count points. But i don't get it!

2021-12-23 15:13

It's cool. Esea advanced teams can beat some of these invites but it's cool.

2021-12-23 01:40

astralis gonna bottle the play in you heard it here first

2021-12-23 01:46

NiP Japanese roster confirmed??

2021-12-23 01:55

extra salt winning this one for sure #FEELTHEHEARTATTACK #SALT

Let the shuffle begin

2021-12-23 02:07

ez4wisla lets goo

2021-12-23 02:13

it's triggering to see fnatic in a British flag

2021-12-23 02:20

no spirit anymore thanks god :D

2021-12-23 02:23

Why? They lost only to gambit, who won the tournament later

2021-12-23 05:51

they dont even have a proper roster now

2021-12-23 08:03

That's right, I just thought he didn't like something about their previous performance at this tournament

2021-12-23 10:14

go go Entropiq ♥️🙂

2021-12-23 02:37

-mibr +any other brazilian team.

2021-12-23 03:00

00nation

2021-12-23 03:12

Sharks deserve more, even pain gaming.

saffe will not be on pain at this point, so sharks will have more chances

2021-12-23 22:31

-mibr +literally any tier3 team from any region would be an upgrade, even 00nation ffs

2021-12-23 10:58

Nice list of teams. Let's go Na'Vi

2021-12-23 03:21

Faze up baby

2021-12-23 03:31

Mibr kkkkkkkkkkkk

2021-12-23 03:44

First title for the CSGO king m0nesy

2021-12-23 03:45

can't wait to see my boy geroman

2021-12-23 04:11

Ez for NIP Japan

2021-12-23 04:17

MIBR farming spots/invites just by staying on SA

2021-12-23 04:30

let's go my boi <3

2021-12-23 05:00

Ez for falmes 🙂

2021-12-23 06:25

Wisla and tylul XD

2021-12-23 08:21

Ez for fashr

2021-12-23 08:25

no sprout? wtf lost all respect

2021-12-23 09:43

wooooow no female team????

2021-12-23 09:53

Polish qualy instead of open qualy. What a SHAME.

2021-12-23 10:35

Polish tournament so polish quali ez It is the same as esl cologne (German team qualified from German quali)

yes, both are a disgrace to have national qualifiers, they should have open qualy instead

2021-12-23 15:54

Still i would keep the national quali, but add mby 2 more slots for open quali

2021-12-23 18:14

ez for fnatic

2021-12-23 10:52

what about movistar???

2021-12-23 11:08

I really hope for a good draw for Wisła, I desperately want a Polish team in Tier-1 event, especially in IEM Katowice, and Wisła with mynio has shown some potential, their firepower looks decent and all of that, they just need to get more chemistry and I really believe they can qualify here.

MIBR wasted spot

2021-12-23 12:03

no BLINK?

2021-12-23 12:27

lol, BIG .... :/ hope to see you soon win again *fingers crossed*

2021-12-23 12:53

Hope this happens in a fully packed arena, or at least in a full-fledged studio LAN like BLAST. It'd be a travesty to go back to online era, though that seems like a good possibility.

2021-12-23 12:55