ESL Pro League S21 watch guide: Schedule, where to watch, teams to watch

ESL Pro League Season 21 is bringing the 24 best Counter-Strike 2 teams in the world to Sweden next month for a massive prize pool and hopes of being the first to reach the Intel Grand Slam.

Spanning across 16 days of action from March 1st to March 16th, the squads will compete for a share of the $400,000 (~£317,680) prize pool, with the winner taking $100,000 (~£79,420) at this Tier 1 tournament.

With the 24 invited teams confirmed, here’s everything you need to know ahead of the ESL Pro League S21.

ESL Pro League Season 21 will take place at the ESL Studio in Stockholm, Sweden. This location is replacing Saint Julian’s, Malta, which hosted the three previous ESL Pro League editions. This is due to a long-lasting partnership with GamingMalta coming to an end.

ESL Pro League is considered an S-tier event, with the win counting towards the Intel Grand Slam, which awards $1,000,000 to the first team that wins four events organised by ESL during a window of 10 consecutive events. Among all the winners of the ESL Pro League and IEM, Natus Vincere (NAVI) and Team Vitality are currently in first place, tied with two wins each.

Aside from the new venue, the ESL Pro League has also undergone other big changes given Valve’s newly enforced tournament operation guidelines, which previously caused a semi-franchised partner team model to dominate the scene.

With the new guidelines, organisations will qualify for the event via their Valve Global Rankings, instead of getting direct access as partner teams. Additionally, Valve has opened up qualification for Tier 2 teams through the ESL Challenger League and reduced the total number of participants from 32 to 24.

The competition is split into two stages plus a playoff bracket. Eight teams will go directly to Stage 2, based on the VRS standings.

In the first stage, from March 1st to the 5th, the 16 invited teams will compete in a Swiss stage format featuring best-of-three matches. The opening matchups will be decided through baseline ratings, with live ratings being implemented in the following Swiss rounds. This will be similar to Elo ratings, as lower-seeded teams will earn more points if they beat higher-rated teams.

After each round, teams will be paired based on their updated ratings, with the restriction that no rematches will occur. At the end of the Swiss, the top eight teams will advance to the next stage.

The same Swiss format will be repeated in Stage 2, with the top eight moving on to the Playoff Stage. Matches will take place between March 7th and March 11th.

In the Playoffs, the teams will compete in a single-elimination bracket starting on March 13th. For quarterfinals and semifinals, matches will be best-of-three, while the Grand Final will be best-of-five and take place on March 16th.

The eight squads that have gone directly to Stage 2 were the top teams in the VRS Global standings as of January 6, 2025:

Team Falcons have been invited after acquiring the majority roster of HEROIC. To replace the departing players, HEROIC have acquired several players from Sangal Esports, who qualified via ECL Season 48 in Europe.

Team Liquid, on the other hand, was put into Stage 2 after FaZe Clan declined their invite. FaZe’s decline to skip ESL Pro League Season 21 is mainly due to the packed tournament schedule for the 2025 season. Its absence has led to GamerLegion being invited.

The other 16 teams are a combination of other top teams from the VRS global standings as well as winners of the ESL Challenger Leagues across Europe, North America, Asia, South America, and Oceania, as well as the winners of the ESL Challenger Atlanta and Katowice:

The first team to watch in the upcoming ESL Pro League is none other than Team Vitality. While they are the second team in the standings, the team has recently won IEM Katowice, beating Team Spirit in a dominant series. Mathieu ‘ZywOo‘ Herbaut ended up earning his 21st MVP award, tying NAVI’s Oleksandr ‘Olehovych ‘S1mple‘ Kostyliev

For Team Spirit, this will be the perfect opportunity to get revenge, considering the team has won several competitions they have taken part in the past two years.

A major roster shuffle was made after the Shanghai Major and the start of 2025, even affecting some of the top teams like G2, which lost Nikola ‘NiKo‘ Kovač who went on to join Team Falcons. Alongside the Heroic core of René ‘TeSes’ Madsen, Damjan ‘kyxsan’ Stoilkovski and Abdulkhalik ‘degster’ Gasanov, the Saudi Arabian team is a must-watch at the tournament.

Aside from these three teams, NAVI is also expected to be a strong contender for the title as they were close to matching Team Spirit in the last IEM, especially on Dust 22, losing the round 14-16.

Unfortunately for fans, it has been confirmed by ESL that there won’t be a live audience for the competition, as all games will be played in private.

The ESL Pro League S21 will be broadcast live on Twitch, as well as on ESL Counter-Strike’s YouTube channel. For those unable to tune in live, matches will also be available to watch on-demand for free via YouTube.