Former PassionUA coach Kane’s recent comments challenge the Major’s position as the biggest CS tournament claiming that the Esports World Cup might be closer to a true world championship has sparked a controversy dividing the community.
With the Esports World Cup in full swing as one of the early tournaments for the second part of the CS2 season, and while it is not treated as highly as the Majors, with a massive prize pool and the excitement around it, the community sees it on par with the likes of Cologne and Katowice. Given how every tournament gets the rotation Major status from time to time, that has to incubate the Valve-described format. Kane thinks that a controlled event like EWC is more of a world championship.
The driving factor behind his opinion is the format of how EWC is played compared to a Major. Format-wise, Major is a month-long event while the EWC CS2 tournament will run for less than two weeks. The high-stakes matches arrive sooner than waiting for three stages before we reach the playoffs, which dilutes the excitement factor. Early stages of the Major bring fewer upsets compared to EWC where teams are treated harshly, given that two losses in a row might see them head out.
While the CS Major format was called into question many times in the past, the event is arguably the most loved one among CS2 fans and for good reasons. Majors bring decades’ worth of tradition that every professional player dreams of winning, and for it to be compared with a rather new event like the EWC will upset a few sentiments. Kane’s comment might have come from the perspective of a coach, where a smaller number of matches allows him to keep control of how much of the playbook he wants to reveal.
The true intention of these comments were to speak his mind, but given how the sentiments of the community are around a Major, it is hard for everyone to accept anything besides it as the holy grail of competitive CS.
