PGL cancels a CS2 tournament in 2026 because of EWC’s expansion

PGL has canceled its CS2 tournament scheduled for August 2026 after the expansion of the Esports World Cup (EWC) next year, which will feature 32 teams, a new format, and an extra week.

Though PGL didn’t nominally mention EWC and the ESL FACEIT Group, it did throw a jab at them for doing it.

We will not be running our August 6–16, 2026 Counter-Strike 2 event.

The decision follows another tournament being announced at a later date that overlaps with ours, despite our schedule being published in March 2024.

We appreciate your understanding.

With the expansion of EWC to 32 teams, most of the top CS2 teams in the world would likely refuse an invitation to PGL’s now-canceled tournament, leaving the Romanian organizer with an expensive event featuring only tier-two teams.

This isn’t the first time that a tournament organized by ESL has affected PGL’s planning. In September, PGL had to adjust PGL Masters Bucharest‘s schedule to avoid a clash with IEM Chengdu and thus convince the top teams to attend, but it was in vain.

For PGL’s CEO, Silviu Stroie, ESL and BLAST work together to prevent PGL from expanding its footprint in the CS2 scene, he said in September.

For anyone asking about Bucharest and Chengdu, we’ve announced our dates for events in 2025 and 2026 on March 31, 2024. They well knew our dates for both 2025 and 2026 before they decided they wanted to continue the monopoly, and they will do whatever it takes to stop teams from playing PGL events. So there is no randomness; it’s a joint strategy.

Even though Valve has killed the partnership leagues that ESL and BLAST had, we’re seeing teams still prioritize their events over PGL and other tournament organizers.

But, it’s unclear whether Valve will intervene again, or if PGL will just have to adapt its business model to convince the best CS2 teams. As of right now, it seems like this battle behind the scenes will carry on for a while.

Feature image credit: © PGL