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ESL One Berlin Major preview

ESL One Berlin Major is the second Dota Pro Circuit Major of the season. The tournament features 18 teams... Radu M. | 25. April 2023

ESL One Berlin Major is the second Dota Pro Circuit Major of the season. The tournament features 18 teams that were selected based on their regional results. This guarantees that the strongest Dota 2 competitors on the planet will attend the event.

The duration of the Berlin Major is 11 days. During this time, we’ll be able to see plenty of great matches and enjoy a show that brings together not only the best teams in Western Europe but from everywhere else. In particular, Chinese teams will be very interesting to watch because they have a lot to prove.

Right now, China still enjoys four Major slots for each Tour and people are starting to doubt Valve’s decision. Other regions, such as North America and South America, seem to be more deserving of an extra qualification spot.

Dates and format

ESL One Berlin Major takes place between April 26-May 7. The total prize pool is $500.000. The winner receives $200.000. More importantly, the tournament offers 2700 DPC points, so a good result here, combined with the regional result in Tour 2, would contribute significantly to a team’s global ranking.

The format will be a very common one. For the group stage, the teams are divided into two groups of nine. The round-robin format is used. Every match is best-of-two. The top four teams advance to the upper bracket. The fifth and sixth place teams advance to the lower bracket. The bottom three teams get eliminated.

As usual, only the top eight participants are rewarded with money and points, which means that 10 of the 18 teams will go home empty-handed. This isn’t a great way to create a sustainable professional circuit, but those are the rules for now.

Participants

The list of participants is full of formidable teams, many of which are former TI champions or at least former Major winners.

  • Team Liquid
  • Tundra Esports
  • Gaimin Gladiators
  • OG
  • 9 Pandas
  • Team Spirit
  • BetBoom Team
  • Xtreme Gaming
  • LGD
  • Invictus Gaming
  • Team Aster
  • Talon Esports
  • Execration
  • Team SMG
  • TSM
  • Shopify Rebellion
  • Beastcoast
  • Evil Geniuses

Groups

Here are the initial groups of ESL One Berlin Major 2023:

Group A

  • 9 Pandas
  • BetBoom Team
  • Evil Geniuses
  • Execration
  • Gaimin Gladiators
  • LGD
  • Team Aster
  • Team Liquid
  • TSM

Group B

  • Beastcoast
  • Invictus Gaming
  • OG
  • Shopify Rebellion
  • Talon Esports
  • Team SMG
  • Team Spirit
  • Tundra Esports
  • Xtreme Gaming

In both groups, there will be a lot of hyped matches. But group A is arguably much stronger than group B.

Header: ESL