ESL One Cologne 2018 first matches and groups revealed
The ESL One Cologne 2018 will be as interesting as usual, but this time it will ignite the competition between teams from the start.
The groups and first match-ups for ESL One Cologne have been announced.
The $300,000 tournament taking place in Cologne, Germany will kick off on July 3rd with 16 teams separated into two groups. The action will last until July 8th.
The group stage will have a double-elimination format with best-of-one opening matches. All the other games during the group stage will be best-of-threes.
The top three sides from both groups will advance to the playoffs. The first team in the group will qualify for the semi-finals while the second and third placed squads book their tickets to the quarter-finals.
Group A features Astralis, mousesports, and Natus Vincere while FaZe, MIBR, and Liquid headline Group B. The full group draw can be found below:
- Group A
NiP
ENCE
Cloud9
mousesports
G2
Gambit
Natus Vincere
- Group B
Renegades
B.O.O.T-d[S]
MIBR
fnatic
BIG
North
Liquid
Astralis vs. ENCE
NiP vs. Cloud9
mousesports vs. Gambit
G2 vs. Natus Vincere
FaZe vs. B.O.O.T-d[S]
Renegades vs. MIBR
fnatic vs. North
BIG vs. Liquid
