The European closed qualifiers for the $250,000 CS:GO tournament has been plagued by persistent tech issues, affecting teams like ENCE, Bad News Eagles, BIG and Sprout.

BIG, ENCE and Sprout lost their opening matches to lower-ranked teams, with players reporting that the servers were lagging and the ESEA client was crashing.

The technical issues in the BIG vs Sprout series were so bad that the teams managed only six rounds of play in an hour.

Players from all teams involved didn��t hold back when they displayed their displeasure on social media, with two ENCE players — Pavle ��maden�� Boskovic and Marco ��Snappi�� Pfeffer — posting on their Twitter accounts.

��Two days in a row getting huge lags on three guys because of ESEA client,�� maden said.

��They don��t want to provide us good servers or fix this bug, and that also don��t let us play without the client, we lost full ecos, antiecos, (and) many other rounds because of it.��

We are 3 bo3s, 2 days in a row getting huge lags on 3 guys because of ESEA client, and they for 2 days dont wanna provide us good servers or fix this bug, and they also dont let us play without the client, we lost full ecos, antiecos, many other rounds cus of it

— ENCE maden (@madennCS) February 9, 2023

Players lagging out , esea client crashing , played 6 rounds in one hour , gotta love it

— Tarlea Laurentiu (@lauNXcs_) February 8, 2023

Another professional player, commenting on maden��s Twitter thread, declared that ESEA would ��never�� make a public comment to address the issue.

However, ESEA apologised to Snappi and said it was working on getting everything fixed ��as soon as possible��.

Sorry for the continued issues. We are working on getting everything fixed as soon as possible

— ESEA (@ESEA) February 8, 2023

With all of the problems with the ESEA servers, and with teams losing crucial rounds on their way to series losses, the legitimacy of the qualifiers are now under fire from many teams and players.

9INE, world number 33, were the first team to qualify for IEM Brazil, with HONORIS and BIG set to play the last series of the closed qualifier at 3:30pm CET on Friday, February 10, for the second and final spot up for grabs.

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The event will feature a total prize pool of $250,000 and will be held directly between the BLAST.tv Paris Major RMR events and the Major itself.

Coach Nicholas “guerri” Nogueira and his team were selected based on a sole invite which was designated as “local heroes,” ensuring that there would be at least one team from Brazil competing on home soil. The franchise have been the pride of Brazil, having won the ESL Pro League Season 12: North America. They had also finished 3rd-4th at ESL Pro League Season 15 and the recently concluded Intel Extreme Masters Rio Major 2022.

ESL shared that six teams including FaZe Clan, Vitality, and Natus Vincere were given direct invitations based on their partnership with the event organizer. They also revealed that the remaining four teams invited were selected based on their position in the global rankings system.

ESL also announced the teams that will be participating in the regional closed qualifiers for the Intel Extreme Masters Brazil tournament. In the European qualifier, top teams such as ENCE, BIG, Bad News Eagles, and Sprout will be competing, while the South American qualifier will feature 00NATION and 9z. In the North American qualifier, competing teams include paiN Gaming, and Complexity, while Lynn Vision and IHC will be battling for a spot in the main tournament from the Asia qualifiers, representing their respective regions.

These teams will have the opportunity to earn a spot in the main event through the closed qualifiers. The competition will be fierce as teams will be looking to secure a spot in the main event and the chance to compete for the $250,000 prize pool.

The closed qualifiers will take place in the weeks leading up to the main event, with the top teams from each region earning a spot in the tournament. This will add an extra layer of excitement to the competition as fans will be able to watch the up-and-coming teams battle it out for a chance to compete against some of the best teams in the world.

The tournament which will feature some of the best teams from around the world will provide an opportunity for the Brazilian team to showcase their skills in front of home fans. The team has been performing well in recent tournaments and will be looking to continue their success at IEM Brazil.

2023 Intel Extreme Masters Counter-Strike Teams

Below is a complete outline of the teams participating in the tournament and the regional closed qualifiers.