After the final matchday last Wednesday, the remaining teams finished their eighth matches, concluding the group stage of the Spring ESL Premiership. Six of the ten teams advance to playoffs, where they will contend to join the two top place finishers in the LAN finals, with (a now increased) £13000 prize purse, and a slot in the Mountain Dew league up for grabs.
The final standings after six weeks of play in The @ESL Premiership for Counter-Strike: Global Offensive! Congratulations to the teams that qualified for the LAN Finals and the playoffs! #ESLPrem pic.twitter.com/Y8LsS8RClP
— ESL UK (@ESLUK) March 21, 2018
Group A’s rankings are as expected. Fish123, who now field Epsilon’s full roster, come out on top. The team found relative ease in playing this seasons matches, winning most games by a large margin: Only suffering a close shave to Luminary, where they shut down an 11 round comeback in overtime, and an unusual 16-2 stomping at the hands of Endpoint. Endpoint hold second place at a wide 9 point margin, with Luminary, Epiphany Bolt and PMC being much closer together, the latter team missing out on playoffs by round difference.
Group B features more of an upset, Vexed gaming hold the top spot in the standings, off the back of two close wins (16-14, 16-12) to the group favourites Wind and Rain: these two losses being the only that 2nd placed WaR took during the season. While Radix managed to take a win off the otherwise unbeaten Vexed at the end of the season, they find themselves in the middle of the pack. “KiNgS” (the organisationless name of ex-enclave) make 4th with two wins, at the mercy of Nuclear Storm’s performance: placing last in the group with no wins.
The playoff format will see the 3rd place finishers against the 4th place side from the opposing group for the first round. The loser of this matchup finding themselves in the relegation bracket, and the winners playing against the 2nd placed team from the 4th placed teams group, the winner of each bracket joining the Fish123 and Vexed, group winners, in the LAN finals.
The final standings for the playoff brackets.
The losers of the first round of each bracket will find themselves in the new ESL relegation bracket, in the company of last place finishers PMC and Nuclear Storm, and the top four teams from the ESL Premiership Division two. The top four finishers of this bracket proceed to the next season, and the lower four will have to re-qualify to play in future seasons.
The playoffs will commence on the 26th of March, and end of the 2nd of april, and while the location of the final is confirmed to be at the Haymarket Theatre, Leicester, dates have yet to be announced.
