​The eleventh CS:GO major will commence in less than a month, with its group stage starting on July 16 and its playoffs starting on July 21, in front of a live audience in the TAURON Arena in Krakow, Poland.

The qualification system to determine the sixteen teams participating in the prestigious event is currently under way. Nine teams from Asia-Oceania, Europe, CIS and the Americas earned their pass to compete in the Offline Major Qualifier, which will host the battle between 16 teams. Only eight teams will win the golden ticket and enter the eleventh major as Challengers.





The other eight, known as "Legends," already have their slots locked after placing top eight at the ELEAGUE Major. Already, the eleventh major is looking like it's going to be fire and here are reasons why.







No More Question Marks

Coming into the ELEAGUE Major, there were many question marks. Firstly, among the "Legendary" teams (who had placed top eight at the ninth major, ESL One Cologne 2016) we had the likes of Team Liquid, FlipSid3 and Gambit Esports taking up three spots.

Team Liquid had a miracle run at ESL One Cologne 2016, showing promises and firepower unlike anything we've seen from North American teams. But like the wording suggests, it was a miracle.





Oleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev had made it clear beforehand that ESL One Cologne 2016 will be his last tournament under the stallion banner. We knew that after s1mple leaves the roster, Team Liquid would never be the same, for he was the biggest contributor to the team in terms of fragging and explosiveness.





What s1mple did in Cologne for Team Liquid was the perfect parting gift, carrying them to the grand finals stage one last time before moving onto bigger and better opportunities.





Team Liquid's run at ESL One Cologne was well-earned, but it was questionable if they were, without s1mple, truly a "Legendary" team. Surely, there were many teams around that time who had better contention for that spot. And surely, Team Liquid would've never been able to step up to that height again without the help of s1mple.

FlipSid3 and their title as a "Legendary" team was another question mark. In the group stages of ESL One Cologne 2016 major, they had to beat slumping Ninjas in Pyjamas and mediocre OpTic Gaming. They had an easy pass to the playoffs.





FlipSid3 can put up some exciting performances now and then, like Georgi "WorldEdit" Yaski dropping multiple 30 bombs at ELEAGUE S1, but they were never consistent with their explosive results. Their place in the ELEAGUE Major as a "legend" was dubious.

Gambit Esports, back in 2016, hadn't really proved themselves as a true top ten contender. Only after ESL One Cologne 2016, when s1mple left Team Liquid and Daniil "Zeus" Teslenko joined Gambit, did we start to take the CIS seriously as legitimate play makers.





Even then, we knew they were never going to consistently get top placings at LANs. Sure they were good, but were they "legendary?" I doubt it.





Why do these question marks matter? These teams, who were highly unlikely to follow up their miracle ESL One Cologne 2016 results, had free passes to the ELEAGUE Major. It highly undermined the competitive nature of the ELEAGUE Major, for we knew that these teams never truly embodied the storied "Legendary" title and there were numerous other teams who lived up to that title besides Liquid, Gambit and FlipSid3.





Because of this, the offline qualifiers for ELEAGUE Major almost looked like it could be a major of its own.





Walking into the PGL Major Krakow, we're purged of all the question marks. The teams who placed top eight at the ELEAGUE Major, are all legitimate and make sense as "legends." There are no question marks when you look at the above list.





In the Major Qualifiers, all the "challenger" level teams reside. We have new rosters like G2 Esports and mousesports, who will look to cement their presence by crushing it at the qualifiers and walk into the top ten circle where the big dogs play as one of them.





We have teams like OpTic Gaming, Team Liquid, Cloud9 and Immortals who struggle to penetrate the top circle with legitimacy, for they're always inconsistent with results. If they wish to prove they really belong among the big dogs, they will need to prove it in the qualifier. Their miracle runs should never grant them placings.





For the first time in a while, we'll see a fair fight between the teams, who are now finally where they truly belong, whether be legends or challengers.





There are No Clear Favorites

Known as the Competitive Era, the current atmosphere of CS:GO is at its most unpredictable. Astralis were the favorites to take ELEAGUE Major and the tournament unfolded just as many predicted. Walking into ESL One Cologne 2016, SK Gaming were the obvious favorites to the point ESL should have just handed them the trophy at the start of the tournament.





The past ten majors of CS:GO all took place during a certain dynasty. Whether it be the Fnatic Dynasty, SK Gaming dynasty, or NiP, there were always heavy favorites to win it all. The majors were battlefields for selective top two or three teams. But even in that top three, there was always an irrefutable top one, a team that can crush every other team on the planet.





At this upcoming major, we have five teams, SK Gaming, Astralis, FaZe Clan, Virtus.pro and G2 Esports, who all contend the top one placement in power rankings and who could all potentially be named as the champions of PGL Major Krakow 2017.





The lines are blurry between them. G2 can crush SK, but SK can beat FaZe. FaZe can beat Astralis, but Astralis can demolish Virtus.pro.





No one knows what will happen in Krakow come July, and that's why the eleventh CS:GO major will be the most epic, competitive and exciting battle to ever occur.

Photo courtesy of PGL