IEM Katowice invitees announced

The ESL Pro Tour circuit continues this February with the IEM Katowice 2025 and ESL have just announced the teams who've been invited to take part in the event. These teams should submit their complete rosters on or before 15th January 2025. Valve's latest regional rankings update on 7th January 2025 determined invitees for IEM Katowice, PGL Cluj-Napoca, ESL Pro League and many other events.

Sitting at #3, The MongolZ have bagged a direct invite to the second stage and will be the only Asian team at the event. The MongolZ currently sit above Shanghai Major finalists FaZe, quarter-finalists Vitality and are trailing behind Shanghai Major winners Spirit.

FURIA and FURIA FE both made the cut and bagged invites but the org decided to move forward and send FURIA to the IEM Katowice play-in. Since Falcons recently acquired the core of HEROIC, they have received a play-in invite instead of HEROIC and HEROIC's acquisition of Sangal Esports' core, they're now next in contention for a replacement invite behind FURIA FE.

The first stage, also known as the play-in, hosts a straight forward double-elimination bo3 bracket and sends eight teams to the group stage. The group stage hosts a double-elimination format GSL bracket across two groups, sending the top three teams from each group to the playoffs.