ESL One Fall 2021 Predictions and Preview

ESL One Fall 2021 will be the last Dota 2 event before The International 10. The tournament is scheduled to take place online between August 21^st – 29^th and will feature 12 teams from Europe and CIS. Its prize pool ($400,000) is just 1% of that of TI 10 but the competitors will still enjoy having this great opportunity to test their skills against some of the world’s best teams ahead of the biggest tournament in the history of Dota 2.

ESL One Fall 2021 Details

ESL One Fall 2021 is an invitation-based tournament. Only 2 of the 12 teams go through qualifiers and that guarantees that the participants are exceptional. So far, 5 of them have been revealed.

• Alliance
• Team Liquid
• Team Spirit
• T1
• Thunder Predator

The qualified teams are the following 2:

• Team Empire
• Creepwave

Prize Pool Distribution

The $400,000 will be shared among the 12 participants in the following way:

• 1^st place: $175,000
• 2^nd place: $85,000
• 3^rd place: $45,000
• 4^th place: $25,000
• 5^th – 6^th place: $15,000
• 7^th – 8^th place: $10,000
• 9^th – 12^th place: $5,000

Competitive Format

The competitive format of ESL One Fall 2021 is very simple. For the Group Stage, the teams will be divided into 2 groups of 6. Each group is a single round-robin. Every match is Bo2. The top 2 teams in each group advance to the Upper Bracket. The 3^rd and 4^th place teams advance to the Lower Bracket. The bottom 2 teams are eliminated.

The Playoffs Stage consists of a double-elimination bracket. Every match is Bo3, apart from the Grand Final (Bo5).

Favorites and Predictions

While it is difficult to say who is the number one favorite until we learn who the other 5 participants are, it’s quite clear that T1 and Alliance are the strongest competitors of the 7 that are currently known. Even if Team Secret and OG get invited, I expect T1 to dominate the race and win the tournament.

 

Photo credit: Valve