PGL Major Antwerp 2022 is fast approaching and we wrote a grand article on it about the dates, format, qualifiers & teams. But the road to PGL isn’t a short nor an easy one. Teams will have to run through the gauntlet of RMRs after the open qualifiers, with no regards whatsoever to their former achievements if they want to attend the PGL’s grand tournament with a massive prize pool of $1,000,000. PGL Antwerp will pit the best of best against each other in the forthcoming weeks.
Next week we’ll watch the Regional Major Rankings or rather the last leg of the qualifiers for Americas and Asia, followed by the super-region Europe’s groups A and B the week after this.
PGL’s opening matches for Americas & further details
The Regional Major Ranking tournament for the Americas will begin on Monday and will include four teams ranked in the top 30 in the world.
The first matchups for the PGL Major Antwerp 2022 Americas RMR, planned for April 11-15 in Bucharest, Romania, have been released by the Romanian tournament organiser. At the Valve sanctioned tournament, 16 teams will play in a Swiss-system group for the six seats designated for the two continents.
The qualification tournament comprises some of North and South America's top stars, including FURIA, Liquid, Complexity, Evil Geniuses, Imperial, and 00NATION.
| Also Read | PGL Major Antwerp 2022: Dates, format, qualifiers & teams |
The bouts will be televised on two concurrent streams beginning Monday. with FURIA playing other Argentinians of Leviatan and Party Astronauts taking on the South American mix of Isurus.
Case will face Bad News Bears, while Imperial's "last dance" will face Sao Caetano in the tournament's first Brazilian derby. These two matches will be followed swiftly by Evil Geniuses vs. paiN and Complexity vs. TeamOne.
The last two matches of the first round are MIBR facing 9z and Liquid facing 00NATION in one of the day's more fascinating matchups. Matches in Round 2 will continue later on the same day.
The first two rounds of the Swiss-system will be played on the opening day of the event. Following the opening bouts, teams with a 1-0 record will compete on the mainstream, while teams with a 0-1 record will compete on the B stream. Following the first two rounds, the 1-1 teams will play off on the second day before going on to the final best-of-three matches in the afternoon for teams with 2-0 and 0-2 records.
The third day will feature solely BO3 matches, with six series played before the final three on the final day. According to the statement made by PGL on Thursday, two further matches will be played on April 15 to determine the sixth slot at the Major between the clubs with a record of 3-2
Stream A:
All times are according to UTC+3,
- 12:00 FURIA vs. Leviatan
- 13:15 Case vs. Bad News Bears
- 14:30 Evil Geniuses vs. paiN
- 15:45 Liquid vs. 00NATION
- 17:00 1-0 Match #1
- 18:15 1-0 Match #2
- 19:30 1-0 Match #3
- 20:45 1-0 Match #4
Stream B:
- 12:00 Party Astronauts vs. Isurus
- 13:15 Imperial vs. Sao Caetano
- 14:30 Complexity vs. TeamOne
- 15:45 MIBR vs. 9z
- 17:00 0-1 Match #1
- 18:15 0-1 Match #2
- 19:30 0-1 Match #3
- 20:45 0-1 Match #4
We’ll follow up with exact schedules for CEST and up to date betting odds and predictions next week, before the matches commence on Monday.
Europe RMR Group A and B details
Europe (April 17-24) - 16 spots
Europe will be divided into two groups, A and B, for the first time as the super-region of the tournament.
On the European and CIS side, 13 slots were allocated to teams who finished in the top 16 at the previous Major, with the remaining distributed over five qualifiers: four for Europe & CIS teams and one for Far East Russia.
K23, which is presently ranked among the top 20 teams on HLTV.org, SKADE, Wisla Krakow, ECSTATIC, and Apeks, among a slew of other noteworthy names from the most competitive area in CS:GO, did not make the cut.
European RMR A
Invited Teams - PGL Major Stockholm 2021
- Natus Vincere
- Heroic
- Virtus.pro
- Team Vitality
- FaZe Clan
- MOUZ
Open Qualifiers
- BIG
- GamerLegion
- Fnatic
- SAW
- OG
- Eternal Fire
- Dignitas
- Team Unique
- forZe
- Team QUAZAR,
European RMR B
European RMR B is scheduled to take place from April 21st to 24th with the following teams set to be a part of it,
Invited Teams - PGL Major Stockholm 2021
- G2 Esports
- Gambit Esports
- Ninjas in Pyjamas
- Entropiq
- Copenhagen Flames
- Astralis
- ENCE
Open Qualifiers
- HEET
- SINNERS
- Team Spirit
- AVE
- Sprout
- Bad News Eagles
- Endpoint
- Sangal Esports
- Anonymo Esports
The super-region teams are divided into two groups of 16, and they will compete in Swiss formats and provide a total of seven Legend, six Challenger, and three Contender slots throughout the two events.
As always next week we’ll follow up with the detailed matchup analysis, schedule and betting odds updates. Stay tuned for our PGL news since we’ll be covering it exclusively.
