The road to the upcoming Katowice Major for CS:GO is already underway, with teams making new signings and preparing for the qualification process for the biggest competition since the Faceit London Major last September, and now the Intel Extreme Masters website has revealed groupings for the Minor events.
In terms of format, these four regional Minors will have eight participants each, split into two groups for a double elimination competition. Opening matches are best-of-one, with the decider, elimination, and winners matches being best-of-three, the latter of which is new for 2019.
The top two teams from each group go to the playoffs, and below are the opening matches for the Minors for each region:
CIS (January 16-20)
Group A
Gambit Esports vs. Syman Gaming
Nemiga Gaming vs. Team Spirit
Group B
AVANGAR vs. pro100
RuntimeGG vs. Winstrike Team
Europe (January 16-20)
Group A
mousesports vs. Valiance&CO
Team Vitality vs. OpTic Gaming
Group B
North vs. Windigo Gaming
ex-Space Soldiers vs. ENCE eSports
Americas (22-26 January)
Group A
NRG Esports vs. Imperial e-Sports
Bravado Gaming vs. INTZ
Group B
Team Envy vs. Team oNe E-Sports
FURIA Esports vs. eUnited
Asia (22-26 January)
Group A
Renegades vs. Aequus Club
CyberZen vs. Grayhound Gaming
Group B
ViCi Gaming vs. GOSU
Beyond Esports vs. MVP PK
Which matches are the highlights here?