Team ranking: November 2023
Vitality make their return and numerous other changes play out in this month's team ranking.
November marked the first full month of Counter-Strike 2 matches as CS:GO was made unavailable and further updates to the new game rolled out. The changes brought much-needed quality-of-life improvements and gameplay adjustments that were praised by players and the community alike, with some of them even rolling out mid-tournament, such as during CS Asia Championships in Shanghai.
Five notable international LAN events took place over the month: The aforementioned CAC tournament in China, PARI Please, BLAST Premier Fall Final, ESL Challenger Jönköping, and Elisa Masters Espoo. Some smaller, local and regional LANs also played out, including A1 Adria League Season 12 Finals, Tipsport MCR 2023 Finals, and Svenska Cupen 2023.
Plenty of online competitions also unfolded, including a handful of CCT Series, regional qualifiers for ESL Challenger Atlanta and BetBoom Dacha, and a wealth of other regional leagues and tournaments.
For new readers or those in need of a refresher, here's a summary of how the HLTV World Ranking by 1xBet works:
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. Online matches and tournaments are included, but with a diminishing factor which means they cannot make a big difference among the top teams, and mainly serve to put new teams on the map.
Below is the current top 30 table as of Monday, December 4, 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
FaZe remain on top
FaZe held on to their spot at the top of the world rankings after they added another trophy to their cabinet, winning CS Asia Championships in Shanghai off the back of a stellar run of form from Robin "ropz" Kool.
The European combine had the advantage of having their full roster at an event where ENCE and Ninjas in Pyjamas both had stand-ins, and they took down both teams en route to the trophy. Most impressive were their wins over MOUZ, however, once in the group stage and again in the grand final to lift their second LAN trophy in CS2.
Their dominance in Sydney, Thunderpick World Championship, and CAC carried into BLAST Premier Fall Final, where Finn "karrigan" Andersen's side extended their best-of-three winstreak to 18 to reach the grand final. The streak was finally broken by the very team it began against in Sydney, Vitality, who claimed the trophy after a 2-0 victory in the title decider.
Russel "Twistzz" Van Dulken's departure was announced shortly after the end of the tournament, and as such, FaZe's winstreak and run of trophies being broken by Vitality comes almost as a relief, rather than it fizzling out due to a player change. Whether FaZe can continue their winning form with the expected addition of David "frozen" Čerňanský, who should debut for them at BLAST World Final, is something to keep an eye on for December.
Vitality return to form with mezii
The loss of Emil "Magisk" Reif, Danny "zonic" Sørensen, and sports psychologist Lars Robl to Falcons came as a huge blow to Vitality, and the impact was apparent at IEM Sydney. The Paris Major champions looked a shadow of themselves and went out of the event in joint-last place following losses to FaZe and BetBoom, and didn't play another event for over a month.
They finally made a return at BLAST Fall Final after reinforcing their ranks with William "mezii" Merriman and Rémy "XTQZZZ" Quoniam, and the changes were successful ones as the team fought past HEROIC, Complexity, Cloud9, and FaZe en route to the trophy.
Mathieu "ZywOo" Herbaut, who had some pundits questioning his form in CS2 after a lackluster first six maps in the title, stepped up massively in the latter portion of Vitality's run and clinched the MVP award in the process. Lotan "Spinx" Giladi and Shahar "flameZ" Shushan did the rest of the heavy lifting while mezii had relatively low impact, fragging-wise: Something which offers some promise going forward for this Vitality roster as the Brit gets more comfortable in his roles.
FURIA, 9 Pandas, Monte clinch trophies
After four years without a trophy, FURIA finally ended their title drought in Finland at Elisa Masters Espoo. The Brazilian team have been fumbling for form since adding Gabriel "FalleN" Toledo and have repeatedly struggled against lower-tier opposition, but a switch of captaincy to Andrei "arT" Piovezan seems to have done wonders to change their fate.
The event saw Kaike "KSCERATO" Cerato back to his best as FURIA fought past Complexity and MOUZ in the group stage before completing their run to the title with wins over HAVU and Apeks, the two surprises of the tournament. The result pushed FURIA back into the top ten of the rankings for the first time since May, while Apeks' own run helped them re-enter the top 15 which they fell out of in September.
Monte only gained one ranking spot this month, but also had a trophy win to celebrate: The Ukrainian-majority squad went undefeated at ESL Challenger Jönköping to lift their first international LAN trophy, taking down TYLOO, Nouns, Virtus.pro, and Eternal Fire in the process.
9 Pandas also climbed 23 spots courtesy of a title-winning campaign at PARI Please, Denis "seized" Kostin's first international LAN victory since ESL One New York 2016. The Russian team entered the event as the second-lowest ranked squad, but secured wins over BetBoom, MIBR, FURIA, and Eternal Fire to lift their cheque.
HAVU with an astronomical rise
A colossal +120 jump in the rankings makes HAVU's name immediately stand out in the top 30 list, but there is little doubt that their climb is deserved. The Finnish team had a heroic run at Elisa Masters Espoo and topped Group A with wins over ENCE and GamerLegion, but couldn't keep that good form going after crumbling to FURIA on stage.
Richard 'Xizt' Landström
Nikola 'NiKo' Kovač
Nemanja 'nexa' Isaković
Ilya 'm0NESY' Osipov
Jan 'Swani' Müller
Håvard 'rain' Nygaard
Robin 'ropz' Kool
Helvijs 'broky' Saukants
Filip 'NEO' Kubski
Guy 'NertZ' Iluz
Pavle 'Maden' Bošković
Álvaro 'SunPayus' García
Daniil 'headtr1ck' Valitov
Abay 'HObbit' Khassenov
Russel 'Twistzz' Van Dulken
Maximiliano 'max' Gonzalez
Nicolás 'buda' Kramer
Matias 'HUASOPEEK' Ibañez Hernandez
Edgar 'MarKE' Maldonado
Ádám 'torzsi' Torzsás
Jimi 'Jimpphat' Salo
Tiago 'JUST' Moura
Adam 'adamS' Marian
Justinas 'jL' Lekavicius
Aleksandar 'CacaNito' Kjulukoski
Andrew 'kaze' Khong
Nicolas 'Keoz' Dgus
Johnny 'JT' Theodosiou
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