Esports World Cup qualifiers open now

The Esports World Cup has opened up regional qualifiers for it's Counter-Strike event to be held later this year. Spirit, the winners of IEM Katowice 2024, are currently the only team invited to the event thanks to their conquest in Poland earlier this winter.

North America will see the Open Qualifiers for the event begin on April 16th through April 17th, with the Closed Qualifiers to take place in the two days immediately after.

These dates are in between IEM Chengdu 2024 and ESL Pro League Season 19, leaving little time for North American organizations involved in both events to get any sort of breath. M80, FURIA, and Complexity will face an exceptionally rough travel time as they will have to fly back from China to the United States, immediately compete, and then fly out following the closed qualifier to attend the Malta-based event.

You sign up for the open qualifiers here.

Earlier this year, the Esports World Cup announced a stipend program for participating organizations, 22 of which will be directly invited and six will have to apply. Additionally, a one-time stimulus is available to teams that want to enter into new esports titles to compete in the cross-game tournament.

The stipend program comes amidst a massive spending spree by Saudi Arabia in the esports and traditional sports spaces, which critics have criticized as a clear case of "sportswashing". Saudi Arabia has been criticized for its historic and ongoing mistreatment of the LGBTQ+ community, women, religious and ethnic minorities, among others, and its reactionary and regressive positions on human rights.