HLTV.org live from Sydney

Our two-man team arrived at the ESL Studios in Sydney, Australia, where the IEM Sydney 2018 group stage is about to kick-off.

The second edition of IEM Sydney will feature 16 teams—split into two eight-team GSL groups—, a $250,000 prize pool and will take place on May 1-6. The first three days will be reserved for the group stage, with the playoffs being held in the Qudos Bank Arena, starting Friday.

Players will soon take their seats and start the matches

Top tier teams such as Astralis, fnatic and FaZe are present at the event, while Natus Vincere and Space Soldiers were forced to pull out due to visa issues. Alongside the European and North American competition, seven APAC teams will be present at the event as well—with North America-residing Renegades bringing that number up to eight—, all of whom will be trying to pull off an upset and make it to the arena.

Our coverage team, consisting of Radoslaw "Makku" Makuch and Zvonimir "Professeur" Burazin has arrived at the venue and will be bringing you coverage of the tournament over the course of the week. Before it all starts off, be sure to read out our article outlining the four key storylines and check out our viewer's guide to get up-to-date on the schedule and the format of IEM Sydney 2018.

For updates on how the tournament is progressing, leave us a follow on Twitter, where we will be posting match results and statistics, and Instagram, where we will be bringing you some behind-the-scenes shots.

Astralis #1 Andreas 'Xyp9x' HøjslethPeter 'dupreeh' RasmussenLukas 'gla1ve' RossanderNicolai 'device' ReedtzEmil 'Magisk' Reif Natus Vincere #2 Ioann 'Edward' SukharievDanylo 'Zeus' TeslenkoEgor 'flamie' VasilyevOleksandr 's1mple' KostylievDenis 'electroNic' Sharipov fnatic #3 Robin 'flusha' RönnquistJesper 'JW' WecksellFreddy 'KRIMZ' JohanssonJonas 'Lekr0' OlofssonMaikil 'Golden' Selim FaZe #4 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 Renegades #16 Justin 'jks' SavageAaron 'AZR' WardJoakim 'jkaem' MyrbostadKarlo 'USTILO' PivacNoah 'Nifty' Francis