CS:GO Might Return to LAN in December With IEM Global Challenge

ESL might have dropped a piece of sad news with the cancellation of ESL One Major Rio 2020 but it has sure made up for it by announcing three back-to-back action-packed tournaments, which includes a planned LAN return for December with IEM Global Challenge 2020.

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CS:GO Might Return To LAN In December

It has been a long time since CS:GO has witnessed a LAN tournament and ESL plans on conducting one later this year with IEM Global Challenge 2020 which has been scheduled to take place in Cologne from 15^th - 20^th December.

The tournament will be featuring a massive prize pool of $500,000 which comes from the amount deferred from ESL One Cologne 2020 earlier this year. The amount was originally meant to be redistributed for tournaments taking place in 2020.

This tournament will be a part of the Intel Grand Slam Season 3 and will be witnessing participation from 8 directly invited teams. None of the teams has been announced yet and will be revealed in the weeks leading up to the tournament.

RELATED:  ESL One Rio Major 2020 Cancelled Due to COVID-19 Pandemic

Event Format

The 8 invited teams will be divided into 2 groups of 4 teams each, both these groups will follow a best-of-three double-elimination format as the top two teams from each group qualify for the playoffs. The playoffs will feature a single-elimination bracket with each match being a three-game series except for the grand final which will be a best-of-five series.

How the $500,000 prize pool will be divided between the teams has also not been revealed but most probably all the participating teams will be walking away with some percentage of the prize money, considering the fact that only 8 teams will be competing for such a massive amount.

Earlier this year there were similar speculations regarding ESL One Cologne 2020 as well, that it might be the first LAN tournament since the pandemic but as the scheduled date of the tournament drew closer the decision had to be changed.

RELATED:  IEM Melbourne 2020 Postponed to 2021

Now ESL has announced that a LAN tournament might take place in December this year once again in Cologne, they have stated that this is their ‘Plan A’ for now which is subjected to change depending on the global health situation which means there is a chance that even this tournament might be converted into an online event at the last possible minute.