Four teams to miss PGL Bucharest 2025 due to organizers' error

Tournament operator PGL has released an updated team list for the European, North American, and South American qualifiers for the upcoming PGL Bucharest 2025, announcing that ESC, Fire Flux, FAVBET, and Chimera have had their invites to the European qualifier revoked.

This comes after the tournament organizers admitted to an error in the invitation process, which resulted in the European and South American qualifiers being delayed by a week.

Initially, PGL distributed slots at closed qualifiers and held open qualifiers without waiting for all 12 invites to the main competition to be fully distributed. This was due to protracted negotiations between PGL and some clubs over the distribution of the prize pool, an approach that does not follow Valve regulations.

After the postponement of the qualifiers, the organizers restarted the invitation process, giving squads that initially refused to participate a chance to change their minds. Thus, HEROIC, Nexus, Nemiga and BC.Game accepted invites to the closed European qualifier, although they initially declined. Because of this, ESC, Fire Flux, FAVBET and Chimera lost their berths.

Since the four aforementioned rosters did not initially participate in the open qualifiers, having received invites to the closed ones, they now have no opportunity to advance to the tournament.

"We sincerely apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused. We have learned from our mistakes and are committed to improving next time", PGL admitted their mistake.

PGL Bucharest 2025 will be held from April 6 to 13, 2025, in the PGL studio in Bucharest, Romania. The total prize pool of the event will be $1.25 million, half of which will go to players, half to clubs.

Origin: www.hltv.org