FACEIT Major: London 2018 - Everything you need to know

With E-Sports at its peak during the August-September period, CSGO's thirteenth Major is just around the corner. With the conclusion of The International 8, Valve can now focus on CSGO's second Major of the year.

Third Party CSGO client FaceIt has been given the rights to host the event. Their location of choice has been London. This will be the very first CSGO major in the UK. The Twickenham Stadium will host The New Challengers and The New Legends stage while SSE Arena, Wembley will host The New Champions stage.

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When is the Major?

The FaceIt Major: London begins on September 5th with the New Challengers stage. The New Challengers stage concludes on 9th September. The New Legends stage begins on 12th September and ends on 16th. The final, New Champions Stage begins on 20th September and the Grand Finals take place on 23rd concluding the event.

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How many teams will be participating and what will be the format?

The Major will have 24 participants. The top 8 teams from the previous Major, E-League Boston, will participate as Legends. The next placed 8 teams from Boston will participate as the Boston's Fallen Challengers. The 8 teams which qualified via Qualification Minors will participate as the Minor's Champions.

The New Challengers stage will consist of 16 teams (Boston's Fallen and Minor Champions). They will play in a Swiss Format where they are first randomly drawn to face each other and then the teams with the same record keep facing each other. For example, the 8 teams that won their games will face each other in 4 matches and the 8 teams that lost will face each other. The teams that lost the winner's match and the teams that won the losers match(i.e. with a 1-1 record) will face each other again. This will carry on till a team either wins or loses 3 games. While 3 wins will confirm their qualification to the next round, 3 losses will result in elimination.

The New Legends stage will consist of 16 teams as well. The 8 Legends will enter the tournament at this point. The 8 teams who qualified from the New Challengers will be the other 8 participants. The format of this round will be exactly the same. The 8 teams who qualify will move on to the New Champions stage. The seeding for the teams to match teams with equal records against each other will follow the Buchholz system which is used in chess.

The New Champions stage will be played as regular single elimination playoffs. The remaining 8 teams will be drawn against each other in the Quarter Finals. The 4 winners will play the semi finals and the 2 winners will play the Grand Finals.

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Where can I watch the Major?

Anybody who possesses a copy of Counter Strike: Global Offensive can watch the Major in-game for free. For anyone else who would like to be introduced to the world of pro CSGO, you can also watch it for free on FaceIt's Official Twitch and Youtube channels.

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How much is the prize pool of the Major?

The prize pool of the Major will be $1,000,000 as in every other Major since MLG Columbus 2016. The winners will take home $500,000 and the top 16 teams will receive reducing prize money.

The Participating Teams

The tournament will see 24 teams with players coming from 19 different countries. Denmark is the most represented country with 17 players in the tournament. Jordan will be represented for the first time in CSGO Majors with Hellraiser's Issaa being the sole representative.

I will run down every participating team in the Major sorting by their status in the tournament.

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The Minor Champions

The Minor Champions are those teams who have qualified via their regional minors. A total of 8 teams qualified from the 4 regions with 2 qualifying from each region.

Ninjas in Pyjamas - The winners of the Europe Minor, one of CSGO's most legendary team of NiP makes their return to Majors after missing two consecutive ones. The team emotionally won the major and qualified for the Major once again. Get Right, Forest, Rez, Dennis and Lekro will be looking forward to playing on the biggest stage again.

Optic Gaming - One of the 3 Danish rosters in the tournament. Optic was the favorite to win the Europe Minor and they finished second. Konfig, Gade, CajunB, Snappi and Jugi will look to make an impact in their first major as a team.

Complexity Gaming - Complexity upset several teams when they won the Americas Minor. Complexity upset tournament favorites NRG to qualify for the Major. Dephh, Android, Shahzam, Yay and Stanislaw will play in their very first major as a team.

Rogue Gaming - Rogue scrapped through the Americas Minor to qualify for the Major. It will mar Hiko's return to Majors after a whole year. He will be supported by Vice, Cadian, Sick and Rickeh.

HellRaisers - HellRaisers will return to the Major stage after an year's absence. They won the CIS Minor to qualify for the Major once again. Their line-up remains almost unchanged with Ange1, Bondik, Deadfox, Issaa and Woxic.

Team Spirit - Probably the weakest team in the tournament. Spirit's team is almost unheard of. Every player will be making their debut in Majors. Their line up consists of Coldy, Sotfik, Davcost, Dima and Somedieyoung.

Renegades - Renegades had one of the best years of their existence in 2018. They easily qualified to the Major by winning the Asia Minor. Nifty, AZR, Jkaem, JKS and Ustillo will look to trouble all the top teams in the tournament.

Tyloo - The Chinese team Tyloo is one of Asia's top teams. After missing out in the last Major due to visa issues, the team makes it back for London. Mo, DD, Somebody, BnTet and XCurrate will try to hold Asia's hopes high.

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The New Challengers - Boston's Fallen

Astralis - No. You read it right. The current #1 team in the world Astralis won't be a legend at the upcoming Major. They will have to start at the New Challengers round and make it through. They will probably quite easily as they are the favorites to win the entire tournament. Device, Dupreeh, Xyp9x, Glaive and Magisk will look to make history at London.

Team Liquid - America's highest ranked team also fell early at Boston. They will start in the first round. But, we can expect them to easily qualify and might even make the play offs(New Champions stage). Elige, Taco, Naf, Nitro and Twist will be a team to watch out for.

BIG - Big had one of the best underdog runs at PGL Major Krakow 2017 and ESL One Cologne 2018. They would look to replicate that performance again. Nex, GobB, Smooya, Tabsen and Tizian will look to pull another upset at London.

Gambit Esports - Winners of the PGL Krakow 2017 fell early at Boston. But they will look to bounce back to their winning ways again at London. With the X-God on their side, anything is possible. Dosia, Hobbit, Mou, Adren and Mir will go into the Major with high hopes.

North - The third Danish roster in the tournament, North have played little brother to Astralis over the years. Although the situation hasn't changed, North does have the potential to cause major upsets. Their line up consists of MSL, Aizy, Kjaerbye, Valde and Niko(Not that one).

Virtus Pro - The Polish squad is going through a tragic time. Their roster is falling apart and their performances has been the worst in their history. As such, they would have had a rough time qualifying for this Major had not they been Legends at Krakow. Not much is expected from Pasha, Byali, Neo, Michu and Snatchie.

Space Soldiers - The Turkish roster which currently has HLTV's highest rated player ever, Xantares can easily overcome any top teams given the raw potential they have. They can really make an impact on the big stage and might even make the playoffs. Ngin, Paz, Xantares, Majer and Calyx will look to make Turkey proud.

Vega Squadron - Vega is one of the 4 Russian teams in the tournament. Possibly the second best one after Gambit, they are still weaker than their Ukranian CIS rivals NaVi. They aren't expected to go much further. Their line up has Hutji, Crush, Jr, Chopper and Kibaken.

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The Legends

This is the most prestigious status to hold in the world of CSGO. Being a Legend now secures Major qualifications for the next two Majors. The Legends are usually the favourites to win any Major. Contradicting that, this might be the only Major that the favourites, Astralis are NOT Legends.

Cloud 9 - Defending Champions, Cloud 9 are almost having a VP-esque disaster period. Their top two players Tarik and Stewie2k were signed by MiBR and their roster has never performed on the level they did at Boston ever again. They will enter at the New Legends stage but not much is expected from Autimatic, Rush, Skadoodle, Golden and Styko.

Faze Clan - 2018 was considered to be the year of Faze. But they missed out on the Major by finishing second and they had a bumpy ride since then. They have won 3 Premier Tournaments since then but they also finished last in E-League Premier 2018. They are still favourites but an early exit is possible. With Olofmeister's return, their line up has Karrigan, Niko, Rain, Guardian and Olof.

Natus Vincere - The team fielding the world's best player Simple, are favourites to win the Major. Na'Vi has been the most impressive team this year after Faze and Astralis. They won 3 tournaments consecutively before this tournament and will look to continue their winning ways. Simple will be joined by Zeus, Edward, Flamie and Electronic.

Made in Brazil - MiBR had a roller coaster of a year. The former SK Gaming fell from grace and has by far their worst year since 2015. They made two roster changes signing Stewie2k and Tarik and even got a new coach in YNK. With these changes, MiBR will look to return to the top of CSGO's food chain in London. Their line up has Fallen, Fer, Coldzera, Tarik and Stewie2k.

Mousesports - Mousesports have had one hell of a year. Their entire team have stepped up their game and their acquisition of Snax made them one of the best teams in the world. They made it to the playoffs at Boston and should easily do so again. Oskar, ChrisJ, Snax, Ropz and Sunny consist of their line up.

G2.Esports - G2's internal affairs have been in turmoil as of late. After months of poor performances, the org handed the responsibility of the team to their ace player, Shox. With Shox at the helm, this will be their first tournament. Their performance can range from being contenders to crashing out early on. Shox will be joined by KennyS, Smithzz, Bodyy and Ex6tenZ.

Fnatic - The legendary Swedish team will return for their 13th straight major. The team has struggled and has made several changes to their roster recently. They even changed their primary AWPer as JW stepped down from the role. The team consists of JW, Flusha, Draken, Xizt and Krimz.

Winstrike Team - Sometimes, nothing makes sense. Sometimes things reach a place where no one will expect them to be. The former Quantum Bellator Fire are one such team. An amateur team who came up to the Major via the online qualifiers, the team stunned everybody as they qualified for the playoffs at Boston. With a couple Major spots confirmed the team dropped back to obscurity and will return again at London. The Russian team consists of Balbina, Kvik, Jmqa, Waterfallz and Boombl4.