ESL has announced that G2 will replace Ninjas in Pyjamas at the upcoming IEM San Jose event.

The Swedish giants had received one of the seven invitations to attend the North American event, which will take place in San Jose, California on November 21-22.

NiP CEO Per Lilliefelth justifies the decision to withdraw from IEM San Jose with the team's "long period of playing and travelling", with the players having decided to use the time they would spend in the United States to prepare for upcoming events.



G2 to attend the event in North America

Replacing NiP will be G2, the surprise package of DreamHack Open Cluj, where they managed to reach the semi-finals before losing to EnVyUs, who would go on to win the event, in a three-game thriller.

Curiously, the news about G2 attending IEM San Jose comes just days after they pulled out of another North American event, the CEVO S8 Finals, due to travel issues, with their spot in the tournament being taken by mousesports.

"Due to a long period of playing and travelling the NiP team has decided to not attend IEM in San Jose as we initially planned," NiP CEO Per Lilliefelth said in a statement. "The players will remain in Scandinavia and concentrate on coming events. "We wish all attending teams a great tournament and aim on fighting them in upcoming events instead."

The news about NiP's withdrawal is likely to fuel speculation about the future of the team amid reports that players are owed thousands of dollars in prize money and outstanding salaries.

NiP addressed parts of Breitbart's report, written by Richard Lewis, on Wednesday evening, stating that, while the organisation "has not always been on time", all the players "are fully informed about the scheduled payouts of their prize and sticker money."

The official team list for IEM San Jose now looks as follows: