Team Ranking: September 2022
It's once again time to look at the most significant ranking changes of the past four weeks as we enter a new month.
ESL Pro League Season 16 stole the headlines all September as the only Big Event of the month, which finally concluded last week. The FaZe and Natus Vincere rivalry may have dominated much of the year, but it was not the case this time around, as the pair struggled in Malta and gave the rest of the field an opportunity to catch up. Vitality landed in third place after winning EPL, G2 broke into the top five with their new roster, and Cloud9 made their return to the top ten.
The 16th Pro League season naturally had the biggest impact on the world ranking, while teams who performed well at the Roobet Cup such as winners BIG took a hit due to the event's points expiring.
For new readers or those in need of a refresher, here's a summary of how the HLTV World Ranking by 1xBet works:
Our team ranking is based on teams' achievements over the past year (with severe decay in points throughout each month), recent form over the last two months, and performance in recent events in the last 3 months.
Each team is required to have a three-man core in order to retain their points. Due to the ongoing coronavirus outbreak, online results, which previously had a minimal effect, now carry more weight as they are also included in the 'Achievements' and 'Recent Events' sub-categories.
Below is the current top 30 table as of Monday, October 3, which goes more in-depth into how the points are distributed — or you can check our special page, where you will be able to find the latest, weekly version of our ranking. You can see the lineup for each team by hovering over their name in the table.
POINTS
Please note that the +/- gain on this table differs from our weekly rankings page, and it is related to the ranking update of September 5.
Vitality overtake Liquid for third place
Vitality have been on the rise ever since the addition of Lotan "Spinx" Giladi to the roster, and their efforts finally paid off with a win at ESL Pro League. The achievement gave them their highest spot on the world ranking since February at third place. Prior to their triumph in Malta, they placed 7-9th at BLAST Premier Fall Groups in August. Spinx, in particular, looked extremely comfortable with his new team — a sign of things to come in the near future.
EPL was a turning point for the European mix, and when the competition finally rolled around, Vitality were an unstoppable force. They scored 2-0 victories over both Endpoint and Ninjas in Pyjamas, reverse-swept fnatic and Natus Vincere, and dominated Spirit 2-0 to finish atop Group A. Vitality earned direct qualification to the quarter-finals as their group's top team and faced off against Outsiders to kickstart their playoff run.
The CIS squad led by Dzhami "Jame" Ali pushed Vitality all the way, but in the end the European mix came out on top and reached the semi-finals. G2 were next in line, but Dan "apEX" Madesclaire's crew triumphed 2-0 to set up a grand final showdown with Liquid.
Five maps and over seven hours later, Vitality had done it. They came back from down 1-2 to win their first Big Event of 2022, and by doing so also finished their ESL Pro League campaign without a single loss. The victory gave Vitality enough points to overtake EPL runners-up Liquid on the world ranking, knocking the North Americans down to fourth place.
G2 return to the top five
G2 are another team that struggled before the summer break, but have since enjoyed a change in fortunes after shaking up their roster. The international side parted ways with Audric "JACKZ" Jug and shotcaller Aleksi "Aleksib" Virolainen and signed the duo of Justin "jks" Savage and Rasmus "HooXi" Nielsen as their replacements.
G2 were placed in Group B at ESL Pro League, a group shared with No. 1 ranked team FaZe. Even though G2 have showed time after time that they're capable of taking down the world's best, the team still had the tendency to falter under pressure. This weakness wasn't visible in the slightest during the group stage, as HooXi's men went undefeated to finish as Group B's No. 1 team without dropping a single map.
The international mix earned a spot in the quarter-finals, where their opponent was one of the tournament favorites, Natus Vincere. The Russian-Ukrainian side struck first and took the 1-0 series lead, but G2 bounced back in the last two maps to claim the 2-1 victory and eliminate Denis "electroNic" Sharipov's men. G2's success would come to a halt against Vitality as HooXi and company exited the tournament in 3-4th place.
Their run may have been just short of championship gold, however it was enough to bump G2 back up to fifth on the world ranking.
NIP fall out of top ten
How a team performs at ESL Pro League can definitely make or break their position on the world ranking, given that no other top-tier events occur simultaneously. Ninjas in Pyjamas were one of the big names to struggle in Malta, as they failed to make it out of the group stage with only two wins.
Their poor performance, along with the success of teams close to their rank such as Cloud9 and MOUZ, was a big reason for the Swedish-majority squad's drop out of the top ten for the first time in 2022.
Another factor for Ninjas in Pyjamas's fall is their changing of the guard recently, in which they signed former G2 shotcaller Aleksib as their in-game leader and benched Nicolas "Plopski" Gonzalez Zamora, losing 20% of their previous points in the process.
Complexity and EG jump 14 places
It goes without saying that Complexity and Evil Geniuses have both had an extremely tough 2022 so far. Johnny "JT" Theodosiou's side have been in and out of the top 30 all year, while Sanzhar "neaLaN" Iskhakov's men hit the organization's lowest-ever rank of 217th place in August.
Complexity sent a message in their first match of ESL Pro League as they took down Astralis 2-1 in their Group C opener. They improved to 2-0 after sweeping the all-French lineup of HEET in their following match, which put a playoff appearance in the realm of possibility. Complexity dropped their next two matches and held a 2-2 standing ahead of their playoff-spot-decider against ENCE.
Against all odds, JT's squad toppled ENCE 2-0 and booked their spot in the playoffs. FaZe may have ended the North Americans' dream in three maps, but for Complexity reaching the knockout stage of a Big Event is already a vast improvement from the results they put up in the first eight months of the year.
Evil Geniuses may not have reached the playoffs in Malta, but the team still scored two victories in the group stage. Back-to-back wins over Eternal Fire and Movistar Riders gave the team some hope for a playoff appearance, but Evil Geniuses ultimately fell short against FURIA in their final match. The team also placed first at the IEM Road to Rio North American Qualifier after a flawless run, which certainly increased Evil Geniuses's points tally on the world ranking.
Honorable Mentions:
- Astralis drop out of the top five
- Eternal Fire make it back into the top 20
- 00NATION lose ten places after quiet month
- Wings Up attain organization's highest-ever ranking at No. 28
Christopher 'dexter' Nong
David 'frozen' Čerňanský
Jon 'JDC' de Castro
Ádám 'torzsi' Torzsás
Dorian 'xertioN' Berman
Dennis 'sycrone' Nielsen
Aleksei 'Qikert' Golubev
Nicolas 'Plopski' Gonzalez Zamora
Håvard 'rain' Nygaard
Russel 'Twistzz' Van Dulken
Robin 'ropz' Kool
Helvijs 'broky' Saukants
Johnny 'JT' Theodosiou
Ricky 'floppy' Kemery
Dion 'FASHR' Derksen
William 'mezii' Merriman
Nikola 'NiKo' Kovač
Aleksi 'Aleksib' Virolainen
Ihor 'w0nderful' Zhdanov
Tsvetelin 'CeRq' Dimitrov
Santino 'try' Rigal
Pavle 'Maden' Bošković
Paweł 'dycha' Dycha
Álvaro 'SunPayus' García
Nemanja 'nexa' Isaković
Adam 'NEOFRAG' Zouhar
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