PGL Cluj-Napoca 2025 teams revealed: G2 Esports and Team Spirit opt out

PGL has unveiled the teams participating in its Counter-Strike 2 event taking place in Cluj-Napoca, Romania next month.

Interestingly, Team Spirit and G2 Esports, the top two teams in the Valve Ranking Standings (VRS), will not be competing in the $1.25m (~£1.04m) event.

The teams invited to PGL Cluj-Napoca 2025 were decided based on their VRS from January 6th, 2025.

Alongside G2 Esports and Team Spirit, French esports organisation Team Vitality and Ukrainian organisation NAVI have also decided not to attend the event taking place from February 14th to 23rd, 2025.

PGL Cluj-Napoca takes place shortly after IEM Katowice which concludes on February 9th meaning some teams have just five days between the two tournaments.

The small gap between tier-one competitions within the Counter-Strike 2 ecosystem comes after Valve announced changes aiming to ensure the shooter’s competitive ecosystem remains open.

On the other hand, with some notable teams choosing not to compete in PGL Cluj-Napoca 2025, it has opened the door for other organisations to take part.

The highest VRS-ranked team from the section period is The MongolZ which won the 2024 Thunderpick World Championship in November. The next best-ranked team is FaZe Clan which recently failed to qualify for BLAST Bounty Spring 2025 after losing in the Closed Qualifiers..

German organisation MOUZ will also compete at the event. PGL Cluj-Napoca 2025 will be the first tournament since the team signed Lotan ‘Spinx’ Giladi on January 23rd.

The full list of participants, and their VRS rankings as of January 6th, are:

PGL Cluj-Napoca 2025 will feature a group stage followed by the playoffs.

All teams will compete in a Swiss system format where the top eight teams will advance to the playoffs. All matches in this stage are best-of-three (BO3) and will take place at the PGL Studio in Bucharest, Romania.

The playoffs will see the teams compete in a single-elimination BO3 bracket until the Grand Finals where the two remaining teams will compete in a best-of-five (BO5) series.

A total of $1.25m (~£1.04) in prize money will be up for grabs, with the winning team taking home $400,000 (~£321,328).