ESL Pro League’s Dull New Format Has Me Begging To Go Back

For me, ESL Pro League has always been one of the most entertaining events in the Counter-Strike calendar. Depending on the Season, we’d have three to five weeks of entertaining action, with the best teams consistently involved across the four groups the entire time. We’d get to see a few teams we don’t usually see at Tier 1 events, which was always a pleasant surprise. That’s not to mention the casters, who were just having a great time after being let off their leash for a more casual Counter-Strike tournament.

And then comes ESL Pro League Season 21. Now, the four groups that made the format unique have been replaced with two huge Swiss stage groups, the first of which exclusively features the lowest-ranked teams in the tournament. Yay.

ESL Pro League: can we go back?

So, we’ve got a tired format that leaves the best teams out of the equation for the first half of the tournament. According to ESL, the format changes were made to “maximise competitive integrity,” but that wasn’t exactly something fans or players were up in arms about in previous iterations of Pro League.

Ultimately, this is my biggest issue with the new format. Swiss, I can live with, but the drop in quality by not having the biggest teams in it from the start is just so jarring. Cool, I get to watch Eternal Fire dumpster Mindfreak. It’s not exactly high-quality CS, though. That’s not to say these types of games didn’t happen in the previous format, but it’s pretty much the entire first group this time around!

Personally, I think ESL got it right last time out. The format had been shortened from five weeks to three, with two groups running simultaneously. We could watch many of the best CS2 teams from the off, instead of whatever this current snorefest is. That’s probably the worst thing I can say about it. I’m just finding it boring. Yes, the casters are still having a good time, but I’m not inspired to watch any specific matches right now.

Maybe I’m being too cynical because it’s still very early days. Perhaps as the first Swiss group concludes, we’ll see more compelling matchups. As it stands, I don’t see it.