IHC, Sprout secure ESL Pro League Season 17 Conference spots*

18-12-2022 20:23

The Mongolian side simply needed to reach the final of ESL Challenger League, whilst the Germans qualified through ESL Meisterschaft.

Update 22:00 : BIG Academy not eligible to participate in ESL Pro League Conference

ESL have informed HLTV that Sprout will replace BIG Academy in ESL Pro League Season 17 Conference due to the ineligibility of the latter.

Two more teams secured their place in ESL Pro League Season 17 Conference on Sunday, with IHC earning theirs through a top-two finish in the ESL Challenger League Season 43, and BIG Academy grabbing one by virtue of winning ESL Meisterschaft.

Over in Asia, IHC were defeated by Lynn Vision in the grand final of the Challenger League, with the latter securing back-to-back titles. Lynn Vision were pushed all the way by their Mongolian counterparts despite heading into the best-of-five with a one map advantage, losing Ancient (5-16) and Inferno (11-16), before coming alive to take Overpass (16-9) and Nuke (16-11).

IHC managed to earn their spot despite losing to Lynn Vision

The Chinese side had already bagged themselves a Conference berth with their success in Challenger League Season 42, and so despite finishing in second place IHC still managed to ensure their presence as well.

Lynn Vision were imperious in their run to the grand final, confidently sweeping strong Asian sides like Rare Atom and NKT along the way. They did not drop a map in the playoffs before the final, and Rare Atom were the only team to even reach a double digit round score against them. The final itself was a stiffer test as they had to recover from a 1-2 deficit in the series, and even overcame a meagre 5-10 CT side on the final map of Nuke.

IHC had to navigate a tougher path, having been knocked down to the lower bracket by NKT 2-0 in the opening round of the playoffs. They did so with aplomb, besting teams like ARAVT, Rare Atom and Wings Up, before bagging revenge against NKT to lock in a spot both in the final and in ESL Pro League Season 17 Conference.

ESL Challenger League Season 43 Asia-PacificBest of 5

Lynn Vision

Matchpage

18th December 2022

IHC

Default

Ancient

Inferno

Overpass

Nuke

In the other tournament that had a spot in the Conference on the line, BIG Academy took down Sprout in the ESL Meisterschaft, dropping the opener of Inferno (11-16) before taking Vertigo (16-12) and Overpass (19-17). No doubt the academy side were driven on by surprisingly vocal support from the BIG fan organisation Roaring Bears, but they were also aided by the fact Sprout were playing with their coach Danny "⁠BERRY⁠" Krüger on top of two further stand-ins.

Sprout had already announced prior to the offline finals in Hannover that this would be their final season participating in the ESL Meisterschaft. Their shift to an international lineup forces them to use stand-ins to compete in the national tournament; and for this season of Meisterschaft, Christoph "⁠red⁠" Hinrichs and Patrick "⁠P4TriCK⁠" Zaremba had been brought into the squad. They detailed their full reasoning for ending their participation in a statement released on their website.

BIG as an organization will need to determine what to do with the Conference spot as their academy team are not eligible to compete in ESL Pro League alongside their primary team. Either the academy team will need to be sold to another organization, or BIG Academy will need to forfeit their spot.

ESL Meisterschaft Autumn 2022 FinalsBest of 3

BIG Academy

Matchpage

18th December 2022

Sprout

Inferno

Vertigo

Overpass

The ESL Pro League Season 17 Conference team list is as follows:

2022-12-18 20:25

nice

2022-12-18 20:26

Go Babos

Damn the downfall of Tyloo and rare atom, the new china era is here.Lets go LVG

2022-12-18 20:29

2 replies

rare atom is in bruh

2022-12-19 10:40

1 reply

I said for the current ESL challenger asia

2022-12-19 12:30

BIG Academy playing in Pro League Conference to... not qualify for Pro League (because the main team is a Louvre partner)?

2022-12-18 20:30

Experience

2022-12-18 22:23

definitely the biggest sports event today, ESL Hannover. Krimbo the GOAT the best of all time.

Can Big Academy compete here? The main team is in Pro League

4 replies

yeah they can play there but not qualify for the main event. At least i think its like that

2022-12-18 21:02

3 replies

they can't play conference

2022-12-18 21:05

For sure?

2022-12-18 21:06

twitter.com/cambronidas/status/160454539..

2022-12-18 21:11

kind of a wasted spot since BIG academy cant qualify to EPL tbh

2022-12-18 20:31

They can't unless BIG provided a written confirmation that their academy roster will no longer be a part of the org. It must've been provided no later than 48h before the first BIG Academy's game in Meisterschaft

2022-12-18 20:41

BIG academy forfeited their position, they cant play the event so sprout got it instead

2022-12-18 22:01

BIG Academy can't compete in EPL Conference as long as they're under contract with BIG tho. Either HLTV is spreading misinformation or they've been told that BIG Academy will no longer be a part of the org.

2022-12-18 20:35

7 replies

Just get "dropped" temporarily ez. Especially since weplay league continuation is still unclear in the future.

it's not gonna come through

2022-12-18 20:37

"since weplay league continuation is still unclear in the future" wdym

2022-12-18 20:50

he means the future of weplay league is unclear

2022-12-18 20:58

Its unclear because weplay is ukrainian and ukraine isnt in the best place right now. Last league had tons of issues but i can only praise them for even hosting them during the war

2022-12-18 21:46

2022-12-18 20:36

If you actually read the article the it says they'll either have to sell the team or forfeit the qualification.

2022-12-18 21:43

Where the hell where zyphon refrezh and launx?

2022-12-18 20:48

6 replies

german tournament, they need at least 3 germans to be in the roster, though, weird that none of main roster players have come to play instead of berry xd

Okay i just thought they where transfered or something :D

But thx m8

2022-12-18 20:51

launx flight got cancelled hence berry

2022-12-18 23:47

they probably had to have a german lineup to participate in the german league

2022-12-18 21:00

Yeah i can see that now thx m8 :)

So this confirms slaxz will be benched if it’s Sprout’s last season in ESL Meisterschaft, no needed for German player to meet requirements… Also, can’t BIG academy still compete in conference but just forfeit their spot to EPL regardless?

2022-12-18 21:04

If Sprout wouldve made it to the conference and qualified for EPL would they have to play with the same roster (with 3 German players) or could they switch back to their main roster?

Sprout did make it. BIG Academy arent allowed to play EPL conference due to being contracted with a partner team so sprout got their spot. confirmed by striker on twitter

2022-12-18 22:02

they are most likely playing with their danish roster. if you ask me they should be forced to play with the roster they qualified with. they're just taking advantage of the system. i'm glad this is their last meisterschaft season, this org is just sad

2022-12-19 07:46

Wait isnt there a rule that an academy team and the actual team cant compete in the same event? So what happens if big academy qualify

2022-12-18 21:44

Sprout qualified to Conference due to BIG academy being uneligible to play because BIG are a partner team so BIG academy forfeited their spot

2022-12-18 22:05

I feel sorry for BiG academy players. They earned their spot fair and square, but they can't compete :( very unluko for them. Academy teams are a big chance and a big help to young players but in some instances, like this one, they're also a big limitation ;(

2022-12-18 22:06

1.5 players from the academy team are playing for the main team anyway :-) I think the rest will appreciate the experience, their time will come - they‘re all definitely promising players for the German scene

2022-12-18 22:09

Sprout playing German ESLM with 2 stand-ins shouldn’t ever be allowed anyway. Unless of course they would participate with the same lineup in the event they qualify for. They’re trying to qualify for events through weaker German competition, and then they don’t even win the event and qualify anyway… Team Spirit waited 7 hours for this twitter.com/chopperis/status/16045714730.. Sprout as an org is just horrible

2022-12-18 22:07

ESL Meisterschaft, ESL Proximus Benelux and the other local ESL qualifiers shouldn't even be a thing if you ask me. It's just preferential treatment for select countries/groups of countries.

2022-12-18 23:20

5 replies

i think its a good system for "bad"/underdeveloped regions to give teams and players from these regions a chance to expose and develop themselves against bigger competition. i just think sprout was clearly exploiting that

2022-12-19 07:44

It's not like they had an alternative. There isn't a Danish or Scandinavian ESL equivalent. Have the events, sure, but granting direct access to pro league is ABSOLUTELY preferential treatment.

2022-12-19 11:58

they had a legit alternative: qualifying through international competition at ESL challenger league. sprout was even playing it as well. sprout let team spirit wait 7 hours for their match just in case they do not qualify through the german event and somehow ESL was okay with it. After BIG Academy beat sprouts ass, sprout waited for confirmation and only then forfeited the challenger league match against spirit hltv.org/matches/2360891/spirit-vs-sprou.. i get what you're saying but its kind of "only" the qualifier for the ESL Pro league main event so i think its alright, there's a lot of t2/t3 teams in the list. a direct invite for the main event would've definitely been too much as well though.

2022-12-19 13:44

You're totally missing/ignoring the point. Of course there are other avenues to qualify, but they are much more competitive than these local ESL events. Again, it's preferential treatment for select countries/regions. "After BIG Academy beat sprouts ass" Sprout played with their coach and 2 stand-ins, and they still needed 3 maps and an overtime to beat them, relax.

2022-12-19 13:52

yeah i might've kinda missed the point there, i understand now what you mean. i partly agree but i still think its a good idea to have these extra chances to qualify for an international t2 event for regions with weaker scenes - the system could definitely be improved though yes i overexaggerated there but sprout is playing with these stand ins for the whole ESLM circuit because otherwise they wouldnt even be allowed to. also big academy had a standin in Krimbo as well. i think they should be forced to play ESL conference with the roster they qualified for (-barry +launx as that was out of their control)

2022-12-19 14:15

babos beste

2022-12-18 22:10

I dont get why Big AC cant keep this spot. IMO they should just be able to keep this position but also be unable to qualify for EPL. They would probably want to play against teams in EPL conference rather than teams in Meisterschaft.

2022-12-18 22:49