ESL has announced the Groups and Schedule of the IEM Katowice 2019 Minors, which will serve as the means of qualification for the Major to be held in Katowice, Poland.
The group stage brackets for the #IEM Katowice 2019 #CSGO Minor Championships are set!
👉 https://t.co/8kkWPEg7Mu pic.twitter.com/JhJ716Mety
— Intel® Extreme Masters (@IEM) January 9, 2019
The Europe and CIS Minors are set to take place from January 16-20, with the Americas and Asia Minors will take place from January 22-26.
The top 2 sides from each region will go straight to the Challengers stage, where they will face the challengers from the FACEIT Major 2018 for a chance to be part of the final 16.
The 3rd placed teams will also have another shot at qualifying for the Major, with a separate stage called Minors’ play in, where the top 2 teams will qualify for the Major.
Below you can find the first-round matchups for all the Minors:
CIS Minor: January 16-20
Group A
- Gambit vs. Syman
- Nemiga vs. Spirit
Group B
- AVANGAR vs. pro 100
- Runtime vs. Winstrike
Europe Minor – January 16-20
Group A
- mousesports vs. Valiance
- Vitality vs. OpTic
Group B
- North vs. Windigo
- ex-Space Soldiers vs. ENCE
Americas Minor – January 22-26
Group A
- NRG vs. Imperial
- Bravado vs. INTZ
Group B
- Envy vs. TeamOne
- FURIA vs. eUnited
Asia Minor – January 22-26
Group A
- Renegades vs. Aequus
- CyberZen vs. Grayhound
Group B
- ViCi vs. GOSU
- Beyond vs. MVP PK
