ELEAGUE has announced further details about the upcoming Premier, beginning early in September.
After a successful major earlier this year, ELEAGUE returns next month with its CS:GO Premier. A special show will air on TBS on September 1, previewing the upcoming tournament.
The tournament itself starts a week later, with eight team competing for a $1 million USD prize pool. Group A, beginning September 8, will be broadcast on TBS as well as the more traditional esports online streams via Twitch and Youtube. The entirety of Group A will be played out across Friday 8 and Saturday 9, with four teams playing for two spots in the knockout stage. Three more groups will follow the same schedule over the following weeks until there are eight teams ready for the quarter finals.
Group A 8-9 September
Group B 15-16 September
Group C 22-23 September
Group D 29-30 September
There is a brief hiatus before the quarter finals begin on October 10, finishing October 11. The semi finals will be played the following day, with the grand final taking place on Friday, October 13.
The format is fairly straightforward. Two teams will qualify from each group via a double elimination bracket. Those eight teams will compete in a standard single elimination bracket, with the top team in each group playing a 2nd placed team from another group, until a winner is decided on October 13. The winners take home half of the $1 million USD prize pool.
The complete team list for the event is still to be announced. 12 teams were already invited at the end of last month, including ELEAGUE Major champions Astralis, ELEAGUE season one champions Virtus Pro, and season two winners Optic. Four slots remain, which will be filled by online qualifiers in the coming weeks. Details of the qualifiers were announced at the same time. They take place next weekend, August 26 and 27, though the competing teams are currently unknown.
In case you missed the original announcement, these are the teams already invited to the event itself:
| Group A | Group B | Group C | Group D |
|---|---|---|---|
 FaZe Clan |  North |  Virtus.pro |  SK Gaming |
 Natus Vincere | mousesports |  Ninjas in Pyjamas | Astralis |
 G2 Esports | Fnatic |  Cloud9 | OpTic Gaming |
| Americas qualifier slot #1 | Americas qualifier slot #2 | EU/CIS qualifier slot #1 | EU/CIS qualifier slot #2 |
Many of the teams involved have undergone huge changes since the major and will be coming into this tournament with a lot to prove. Most of the teams competing at ELEAGUE will take part in Dreamhack Malmo beforehand but with so many strong teams it looks like a tough event to predict.
