The PGL CS2 Major Copenhagen 2024 is the first Major for Counter-Strike 2, and will take place in Copenhagen’s Royal Arena in March 2024.
The PGL CS2 Major Copenhagen 2024 will be the beginning of a new era for Counter-Strike Majors, as Valve made the decision to skip the second Major of the year in 2023 to better accommodate the release of CS2. Missing a Major has made the second half of 2023 less exciting, but has opened the calendar for many other tournaments to get their first taste of CS2 as an esports title. After losing this second Major, Valve have already announced that China will host the second CS2 Major in December. This adds on to an ever-growing list of upcoming events looking to populate the 2024 Counter-Strike calendar. While opinion continues to vary on the competitive state of the game, the excitement within Denmark’s Royal Arena will surely be electric.
PGL CS2 Major Copenhagen 2024 stage name changes
Valve has decided to rename the three stages that make up the main event of the Major. In the past these were referred to as the Challengers Stage, Legends Stage and Champions Stage, respectively. Now they are more clearly defined, as they’ll be called the Opening Stage, Elimination Stage and Playoffs Stage.
PGL CS2 Major Copenhagen 2024 schedule and stages
- Open Qualifiers, January 8 to January 17
- Closed Qualifiers, January 18 to January 28
- Europe RMR A, February 14 to February 17 – Bucharest, Romania
- Europe RMR B, February 19 to February 22 – Bucharest, Romania
- Opening Stage Last Chance Qualifier, February 23 to February 24 – Bucharest, Romania
- Asia RMR, February 26 to February 28 – Shanghai, China
- Americas RMR, March 1 to March 4 – Monterrey, Mexico
- Opening Stage, March 17 to March 20 – Copenhagen, Denmark
- Elimination Stage, March 21 to March 24 – Copenhagen, Denmark
- Playoffs Stage, March 28 to March 31 – Copenhagen, Denmark
Valve’s Regional Standings
We briefly mentioned the Valve Regional Standings in a previous article about the Regional Major Rankings (RMRs). To summarize, it is a ranking system by Valve that assigns points to teams based on the prize money earned, the prize money earned by the opponents they’ve faced, the number of teams their opponents have beaten and their head-to-head results with these teams.
Valve is aiming to create a ranking system that places teams in the correct stages of the CS2 Major based on how well they’ve been performing. This is extremely important as it could be the difference between an invite to the Closed Qualifier and grinding your way through the Open Qualifier.
In the past, the seeding of Swiss Stage has been heavily criticised. At the BLAST.tv Paris Major 2023, we saw FaZe Clan achieve a Challengers Stage spot from the Last Chance Qualifier. This gave them a seeding of 16th, the lowest available. Valve will now update the Regional Standings after the RMRs have been played, so the rankings will better reflect performance at these events, and as such seeding won’t solely depend on these results. Seeding will also aim to be better balanced by changing the system, currently it would be seed 1 vs. seed 16, seed 2 vs. seed 15, seed 3 vs. seed 14 and so on. The new system will see seed 1 vs. seed 9, seed 2 vs. seed 10, seed 3 vs. seed 11 and so on.
PGL CS2 Major Copenhagen 2024 team invites
Based on Valve’s Regional Standings, some teams will skip their respective Open Qualifiers and progress directly into the Close Qualifiers. This is a great advantage, as it allows for better preparation and less unpredictability with relatively unknown names that may participate in the Open Qualifiers. Due to the sheer number of initial teams that have been invited, we’ve put them into a graphic.
Invites are also given out for the RMRs. This is the final chance for teams to secure a spot in the newly named Opening Stage (previously called the Challenger Stage). Reaching this stage is arguably more important for many of the smaller teams than where they place within the Major. While everyone wants to win a Major, especially with a prize pool of $1,250,000, reaching this stage rewards a team with a team logo sticker and player autograph stickers.
Invites to this stage are rewarded based on those who reached the Legends Stage, now called the Elimination Stage, at the previous Major. A core, which is usually three players from a team, will hold the spot in the instance they move teams. This was the case with Team Falcons, who acquired the ENCE core of Marco "Snappi" Pfeiffer, Pavle "maden" Bošković and Alvaro "SunPayus" Garcia. This can also result in teams losing spots altogether if teams disband and lose their core. This can be seen with Heroic, Team Liquid, fnatic and NAVI losing their spots. The invited teams are as follows:
- FaZe Clan
- Vitality
- GamerLegion
- ENCE
- Guild Eagles (formerly Bad News Eagles)
- Falcons
- Into the Breach
- Ninjas in Pyjamas
- G2 Esports
- Apeks
- Monte
- FURIA (only Americas RMR invite)
Major title contenders
As CS2 is a new game and no Majors have been held yet, it’s still difficult for the community to judge who will make the top eight teams, let alone who has the best chance to win the event. We’re seeing more international teams emerge, making some of the national teams we saw at the first Majors feel so far away. Here are a few teams that have may have a chance at Counter-Strike’s biggest prize pool.
Since the event will be taking place at the Royal Arena, there are a few teams that will be on home soil. After Heroic disbanded, Astralis have become the number one Danish team again. Not only are they an organization with a decorated history in this competition, but they’ve got Nicolai "dev1ce" Reedtz back. They’ve continued to make upgrades to this roster, even if it came with decisions that the community wouldn’t have expected. Can this famous four-time Major-winning org do it again on home soil?
As the current Major title holders from Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Vitality have made incredible strides in their first few tournaments. They’ve won both events since the addition of William "mezii" Merriman and could easily continue this hot streak up until the Major. The only team that looks like they can stop them from another Major victory is FaZe Clan. Having struggled in last year’s Swiss Stage, they’ll be aiming to win their second Major and take revenge on Vitality.
Due to the “rostermania” that has occurred during the opening months of CS2’s release, there are many teams that have finalized rosters in the final month of the year. CIS team Team Spirit are one of these, and made a fantastic addition with Dmitriy "sh1ro" Sokolov. Team Liquid are another who revamped their roster by bringing back Russel "Twistzz" Van Dulken, and now have a formidable line-up. He has returned to his former organization to help them win a Major.
How do you bet on CS2 Majors?
If you are not too familiar with placing bets on Counter-Strike 2, you might need a hand to navigate the various methods available for making a bet. To help, we’ve prepared a handy guide for those looking to place a bet during the PGL Major Copenhagen:
Pinnacle offers a number of markets for CS2 enthusiasts to bet on during Counter-Strike 2 Majors. The most popular market for esports bettors is the Money Line market, which is a bet on the winner of a particular match. Futures markets are also on offer if bettors want to bet on the team that will lift the Major title.
If you’re an eagle-eyed bettor, be sure to stay up to date with our PGL CS2 Major Copenhagen 2024 odds page. Pinnacle will offer the best CS2 odds and a wide variety of different markets, both pre-match and in-play.
