The sixth installment of the ESL Pro League Finals is approaching fast, and since it’s the last ESL event of the year, there’s a lot to be excited about.
ESL’s final event of 2017 will be hosted in Odense, Denmark, with 12 of the world’s best teams competing for a total prize pool of $750,000. Six teams from both North America and Europe are ready to take the world CS:GO stage from Dec. 5 to 10, and they were the top in their respective 12-team regions. North America will be represented by Team Liquid, Luminosity Gaming, OpTic Gaming, SK Gaming, Misfits, and NRG Esports and Europe will have Fnatic, FaZe Clan, Astralis, North, Ninjas in Pyjamas, and HellRaisers to play in the Sparekassen Fyn Arena.
As for the maps, any in the current Active Duty pool can be either vetoed or picked—Cache, Cobblestone, Inferno, Nuke, Mirage, Overpass, and Train.
Teams were selected for their groups by the higher seeded teams. These rosters were able to choose which team they didn’t want in their match pool, so that the groups could be balanced. The bottom teams of each pool weren’t able to put teams into the other group because of their low season league seed. Below are the two sets of groups for the opening stage.
Group Yellow
- Fnatic (Chose SK Gaming for Group Red)
- FaZe Clan (Chose North for Group Red)
- Astralis (Chose Ninjas in Pyjamas for Group Red)
- Team Liquid (Chose Misfits for Group Red)
- HellRaisers (Chose NRG Esports for Group Red)
- Luminosity Gaming
Group Red
- OpTic Gaming (Chose FaZe Clan for Group Yellow)
- SK Gaming (Chose Astralis for Group Yellow)
- North (Chose Team Liquid for Group Yellow)
- Ninjas in Pyjamas (Chose HellRaisers for Group Yellow)
- Misfits
- NRG Esports
The Group Stage
The opening matches will consist of a best-of-one, Round Robin format for both groups. The top three teams from Group Red and Yellow will advance to the eight team championship bracket. Each group’s first place team will earn themselves a one-way ticket to the semifinals, while the second and third place teams will compete in the quarterfinals. ESL released the schedule last week for the initial matches, which will be from Dec. 5 to 6.
The Playoff Stage
Once the six playoff teams at the finals are determined, the remaining contenders will play in a best-of-three, single-elimination bracket until two teams are left for the grand finals. To conclude the five-day event, a best-of-five match on Dec. 10 will decide the champion of the ESL Pro League Season Six Finals.
All of the action for the league finals will be livestreamed exclusively on ESL’s Counter-Strike YouTube channel.
