ESL One Cologne 2014 was the third CS:GO Major. Ninjas in Pyjamas, beaten in the final of both previous Majors, came from a map down in the quarter-final and the semi-final, then beat Fnatic over three maps to finally win one. It turned out to be NiP's only Major title of the CS:GO era. The event also changed the items around a Major: it was the first with a souvenir package for every map and the first with a sticker-based Pick'Em, and its Cobblestone packages are where the Souvenir AWP | Dragon Lore story begins.
The event
ESL organised the tournament with Valve's sponsorship at the Cologne exhibition centre, the Koelnmesse, during Gamescom 2014. It ran from August 14 to 17, 2014, with 16 teams and a $250,000 prize pool split the same way as before: $100,000 for the winner, $50,000 for the runner-up, $22,000 per semi-finalist, $10,000 per quarter-finalist and $2,000 for the rest.
- Legends: seven teams from the Katowice playoffs. LGB eSports would have been the eighth, but the organisation lost its team before Cologne. Cloud9 held compLexity's spot, having signed most of that lineup.
- Qualifiers: six European teams (Copenhagen Wolves, dAT team, Epsilon eSports, London Conspiracy, Natus Vincere and Titan), iBUYPOWER from North America, Vox Eminor from Oceania, and Team Wolf from India. The Indian slot was created to replace LGB, making Team Wolf the first Indian team at a Major.
The format stayed the same: four GSL groups of single maps, then a best-of-three single-elimination bracket. The map pool grew from five to seven. Train was dropped, and Cache, Cobblestone and Overpass were added. Overpass had been released only weeks earlier with Operation Breakout, which also introduced the Cobblestone and Overpass weapon collections.
Group stage
- Group A: Epsilon eSports topped the group by beating HellRaisers 16-1 on Inferno and NiP 16-6 on Cobblestone. NiP recovered to beat HellRaisers 16-11 on Overpass.
- Group B: Team LDLC.com won both of their matches. Natus Vincere took the second spot with a 19-17 overtime win over Copenhagen Wolves on Dust II.
- Group C: Fnatic beat iBUYPOWER 16-7 and Virtus.pro 19-16 in overtime on Overpass. Virtus.pro then eliminated iBUYPOWER 16-2.
- Group D: Cloud9 beat Titan 22-18 in double overtime on Dust II and then Dignitas 16-14. Dignitas eliminated Titan 16-1.
Playoffs
Map scores are from the winner's side.
| Round | Winner | Series | Loser | Maps |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Quarter-final | Fnatic | 2-1 | Natus Vincere | Inferno 16-11, Dust II 7-16, Nuke 16-14 |
| Quarter-final | Team Dignitas | 2-0 | Epsilon eSports | Dust II 16-9, Inferno 16-8 |
| Quarter-final | Team LDLC.com | 2-0 | Virtus.pro | Dust II 16-14, Mirage 16-12 |
| Quarter-final | Ninjas in Pyjamas | 2-1 | Cloud9 | Nuke 8-16, Dust II 16-14, Cobblestone 16-14 |
| Semi-final | Fnatic | 2-0 | Team Dignitas | Dust II 16-11, Overpass 16-14 |
| Semi-final | Ninjas in Pyjamas | 2-1 | Team LDLC.com | Inferno 10-16, Nuke 16-6, Cobblestone 16-14 |
| Final | Ninjas in Pyjamas | 2-1 | Fnatic | Cobblestone 16-11, Cache 8-16, Inferno 16-13 |
NiP's route was close throughout. They lost the first map of their quarter-final and semi-final, and won both deciders 16-14 on Cobblestone. Defending champions Virtus.pro went out in the quarter-finals to LDLC.
The final: NiP 2-1 Fnatic
Fnatic arrived with a rebuilt team. Olof "olofmeister" Kajbjer and Freddy "KRIMZ" Johansson had joined from LGB, and Jonatan "Devilwalk" Lundberg had moved from player to coach.
Cobblestone went first, and Fnatic led 11-4 at half-time. According to Liquipedia's half-by-half scores, NiP then won all twelve remaining rounds to take the map 16-11. Fnatic levelled on Cache, where a KRIMZ triple kill closed it 16-8.
Inferno was the decider, and Fnatic's defence put NiP 1-5 down early. Then Adam "friberg" Friberg cleared the whole Fnatic team with an AK-47, getting the last three kills with five health points left, in a round HLTV clipped as its first highlight of the final. NiP still trailed 6-9 at half-time, but won the second half 10-4 to take the map 16-13.
| Player | Name |
|---|---|
| Xizt | Richard Landström |
| GeT_RiGhT | Christopher Alesund |
| f0rest | Patrik Lindberg |
| friberg | Adam Friberg |
| Fifflaren | Robin Johansson |
| pita (coach) | Faruk Pita |
HLTV lists friberg as the event's MVP. NiP had now reached all three Major finals. They would reach the next two as well, but this remained their only win in the CS:GO era.
Stickers and the first Pick'Em
Valve added the ESL One Cologne 2014 Legends and Challengers capsules on August 4, 2014, "for a limited time", with a portion of the proceeds going to the teams. Each capsule gave one sticker: a team in paper or holo, or a rarer event foil.
- Legends: Cloud9, Fnatic, HellRaisers, Ninjas in Pyjamas, Team Dignitas, Team LDLC.com and Virtus.Pro, plus a blue ESL One Cologne 2014 foil.
- Challengers: the nine qualifiers, plus a red ESL One Cologne 2014 foil. Team Wolf's sticker is named MTS GameGod Wolf.
Foil versions of the team stickers came only on souvenirs, according to the Counter-Strike Wiki. The stickers also had a second job. In the new Cologne 2014 Pick'Em Challenge, an unused sticker of a team was the game piece you needed to pick that team, and enough correct picks earned a trophy for your profile. Our guide to Major sticker capsules explains how that system developed.
Souvenirs: one package per map
Viewers still earned drops by watching on GOTV, or on Twitch with a linked account. What changed was the content. Valve's August 8 post explained that each package contains a weapon from the collection of the map being played, with stickers of the two competing teams and a special ESL One Cologne 2014 event sticker. It added that the packages were the first chance to find weapons from the new Cache collection.
That produced seven packages: Cache, Cobblestone, Dust II, Inferno, Mirage, Nuke and Overpass. The Counter-Strike Wiki describes the stickers as foil team stickers plus a gold ESL One design.
Cobblestone was played six times, four of them by NiP, including both of their 16-14 deciders and the first map of the final. Its package could contain a Souvenir AWP | Dragon Lore. It was the first of ten Cobblestone packages, and our Dragon Lore history covers the rest.
Collecting Cologne 2014 items today
- Match the map to the package. For package souvenirs from this event onwards, the skin's collection tells you which map it dropped on, and the description names the match.
- Check the gold and foil stickers. A Cologne 2014 Souvenir should carry two foil team stickers and the gold ESL One sticker. Inspect them for scrapes.
- Read the full sticker name. Cologne hosted Majors again in 2015, 2016 and 2026, so the name should end in "Cologne 2014".
- Search by sticker. The sticker filter on Buy finds guns carrying a specific Cologne 2014 sticker, and the souvenir packages guide explains the later changes.
The next Major, DreamHack Winter 2014, brought a disqualification scandal and a forfeit. Our DreamHack Winter 2014 article covers it, and the Katowice 2014 Major article covers the event before.
Sources
- ESL One: Cologne 2014 — Liquipedia
- NiP win ESL One Cologne 2014 — HLTV.org
- Video: friberg vs. fnatic — HLTV.org
- The Cologne 2014 Pick'Em Challenge — Counter-Strike blog (Valve)
- Cologne 2014: Linking with Twitch — Counter-Strike blog (Valve)
- ESL One Cologne 2014 Souvenir Packages — Counter-Strike Wiki
- ESL One Cologne 2014 — Wikipedia
