IEM Sydney viewer's guide

IEM Sydney will kick off on Tuesday, so we have prepared a comprehensive viewer's guide, where you will be able to find all the essential information about the event.

CS:GO will make its return to the down under with IEM Sydney 2018 which will take place on May 1-6 with a $250,000 prize pool. The group stage will be played behind closed doors in the first three days while the playoffs take place at the Qudos Bank Arena on May 4-6.

Space Soldiers and Natus Vincere—two teams who were initially among the sixteen teams that would attend the event—couldn't secure visas in time and have been replaced by Legacy OCE and G2, respectively.

Astralis will be in Group B

There will be two double-elimination groups, each featuring eight teams. The opening matches will be best-of-ones while all the following games get played as best-of-threes.

The winners of the upper-bracket finals will directly advance to the playoff semi-finals and the runners-up will qualify for the quarter-finals. To round out the team list for the single elimination playoffs, the lower-bracket final winners will also advance to the quarter-finals.

The opening games and the bracket for each group can be found below:

Group A
FaZe	vs. ORDER
Legacy OCE	vs. Renegades
Cloud9	vs. Grayhound
TYLOO	vs. SK
Group B
MOUZ	vs. BOOT-d[S]
NRG	vs. Astralis
G2	vs. MVP PK
Chiefs	vs. fnatic

The full schedule is as follows:

Tuesday, May 1st
04:00	Legacy OCE	vs. Renegades	BO1
04:00	FaZe	vs. ORDER	BO1
05:10	Cloud9	vs. Grayhound	BO1
05:10	TYLOO	vs. SK	BO1
06:20	NRG	vs. Astralis	BO1
06:20	MOUZ	vs. BOOT-d[S]	BO1
07:30	G2	vs. MVP PK	BO1
07:30	Chiefs	vs. fnatic	BO1
08:40	Group A upper-bracket semi-final #1		BO3
08:40	Group A lower-bracket quarter-final #1		BO3
12:10	Group A upper-bracket semi-final #2		BO3
12:10	Group A lower-bracket quarter-final #2		BO3
Wednesday, May 2nd
04:00	Group B lower-bracket quarter-final #1		BO3
04:00	Group B lower-bracket quarter-final #2		BO3
07:30	Group B upper-bracket semi-final #1		BO3
07:30	Group A lower-bracket semi-final #1		BO3
11:00	Group B upper-bracket semi-final #2		BO3
11:00	Group A lower-bracket semi-final #2		BO3
Thursday, May 3rd
04:00	Group B lower-bracket semi-final #1		BO3
04:00	Group B lower-bracket semi-final #2		BO3
07:30	Group A lower-bracket final		BO3
07:30	Group A upper-bracket final		BO3
11:00	Group B lower-bracket final		BO3
11:00	Group B upper-bracket final		BO3
Friday, May 4th
07:00	Quarter-final #1		BO3
11:00	Quarter-final #2		BO3
Saturday, May 5th
07:00	Semi-final #1		BO3
11:00	Semi-final #2		BO3
Sunday, May 6th
07:00	Grand final		BO5

Below you can find the complete on-air team for the English broadcast:

OJ Borg - Stage Host

Tres "stunna" Saranthus - Reporter

 Alex “Machine” Richardson - Desk host

Iain "SnypeR" Turner - Analyst
Janko "YNk" Paunovic - Analyst
Chad "SPUNJ" Burchill - Analyst

Henry "HenryG" Greer - Commentator
 Harry "JustHarry" Russell - Commentator
 Lauren "Pansy" Scott - Commentator
Jason "moses" O'Toole - Commentator
 Jordan "Elfishguy" Mays - Commentator
 Tim "Brainstorm" Dunne - Commentator
 Kevin "KaRath" Zhu - Commentator
Mitchell "pili" Pilipowski - Commentator

 DJ "Prius" Kuntz - Observer
Heather "sapphiRe" Garozzo - Observer
Michael "MC" Campagna - Observer

The prize will be distributed in the following manner:

1. - $100,000
2. - $42,000
3-4. - $20,000
5-6. - $10,000
7-8. - $6,000
9-12. $5,000
13-16. - $4,000

Chiefs #91 Mike 'ap0c' AliferisTyler 'tucks' ReillySam 'flickz' JonesMatthew 'Texta' O'RourkeEuan 'sterling' Moore Astralis #1 Andreas 'Xyp9x' HøjslethPeter 'dupreeh' RasmussenLukas 'gla1ve' RossanderNicolai 'device' ReedtzEmil 'Magisk' Reif Time is adjusted to your selected timezone Natus Vincere #4 Ioann 'Edward' SukharievDanylo 'Zeus' TeslenkoEgor 'flamie' VasilyevOleksandr 's1mple' KostylievDenis 'electroNic' Sharipov MVP PK #27 Keun-Chul 'solo' KangMin-Soo 'glow' KimMin-Seok 'zeff' ParkHyun-Pyo 'XigN' LeeHae-Sung 'HSK' Kim BOOT-d[S] #52 Nevin 'splashske' AwBenedict 'Benkai' TanAnthony 'ImpressioN' LimKumaresan 'Tommy' RamaniAlikhan 'w1nt3r' Kopzhanov TYLOO #25 Ke 'captainMo' LiuHui 'DD' WuHansel 'BnTeT' FerdinandHaoWen 'somebody' XuKevin 'xccurate' Susanto Renegades #15 Justin 'jks' SavageAaron 'AZR' WardJoakim 'jkaem' MyrbostadKarlo 'USTILO' PivacNoah 'Nifty' Francis MOUZ #5 Tomáš 'oskar' ŠťastnýChris 'chrisJ' de JongMiikka 'suNny' KemppiMartin 'STYKO' StykRobin 'ropz' Kool Legacy OCE #134 Egor 'LONSDALE' BaranovChris 'yellow' McGillivrayHugh 'HUGH' AndersonJay 'soju_j' JeongPeter 'BL1TZ' Athanasatos ORDER #43 Chris 'emagine' RowlandsSimon 'Sico' WilliamsJay 'Liazz' TregillgasAlistair 'aliStair' JohnstonJordan 'Hatz' Bajic fnatic #2 Robin 'flusha' RönnquistJesper 'JW' WecksellFreddy 'KRIMZ' JohanssonJonas 'Lekr0' OlofssonMaikil 'Golden' Selim NRG #18 Damian 'daps' SteeleJacob 'FugLy' MedinaVincent 'Brehze' CayonteEthan 'Ethan' ArnoldTsvetelin 'CeRq' Dimitrov Grayhound #36 Christopher 'dexter' NongSean 'Gratisfaction' KaiwaiErdenetsogt 'erkaSt' GantulgaLiam 'malta' SchembriOllie 'DickStacy' Tierney FaZe #3 Finn 'karrigan' AndersenRichard 'Xizt' LandströmLadislav 'GuardiaN' KovácsNikola 'NiKo' KovačHåvard 'rain' Nygaard Space Soldiers #14 Engin 'MAJ3R' KüpeliIsmailcan 'XANTARES' DörtkardeşBuğra 'Calyx' ArkınAhmet 'paz' KarahocaEngin 'ngiN' Kor SK #7 Gabriel 'FalleN' ToledoFernando 'fer' AlvarengaRicardo 'boltz' PrassJake 'Stewie2K' YipMarcelo 'coldzera' David Cloud9 #6 Pujan 'FNS' MehtaTyler 'Skadoodle' LathamWilliam 'RUSH' WierzbaTarik 'tarik' CelikTimothy 'autimatic' Ta G2 #11 Kenny 'kennyS' SchrubNathan 'NBK-' SchmittDan 'apEX' MadesclaireOscar 'mixwell' CañellasAlexandre 'bodyy' Pianaro