The Group Stage at IEM Melbourne 2025 has wrapped up, bringing us one step closer to witnessing Leemate live at the Rod Laver Arena.

But to get there, several teams had to pack their bags - and perhaps not the ones you’d expect.

In Group A, MOUZ, TheMongolZ, and GamerLegion secured their spots in the Playoffs.

The first two continued their dominant runs, on the back of Spinx’s and mzinho’s 1.33 and 1.19 rating performances, respectively. No big surprises here.

GamerLegion showed that their MRQ performance was a one-off, sweeping the Lower Bracket with victories over Complexity and FaZe.

If you needed further proof that the MRQs should be held offline - not to mention the absurdity of coaches being barred from doing what they were hired for - here it is.

As for FaZe, they’re really in the gutter, aren’t they?

Their only wins came against paiN - a team playing with two stand-ins (including a coach) - and 3DMax, a team they should be convincingly beating 11 times out of 10.

Once again, broky was nowhere to be seen. The guy’s going through one of those slumps, and if he doesn’t turn it around soon, he’s probably getting the boot. Look at it, they’re even toying with him…

Over in Group B, where Vitality, Falcons, and Liquid secured their spots in the Playoffs, the real headline was NAVI missing out, giving FaZe a serious run for their money in the 'who's worse' competition.

Just to give you an idea of the mess NAVI is in right now, they decided to ban Mirage against Liquid in the lower final - one of their best maps, if not the best.

And you're probably wondering, why on earth would they do that?

Well, in their previous match against FlyQuest, they actually lost Mirage 13-9. Yes, you read that right. NAVI lost Mirage to FlyQuest in big 2025. You seriously can’t make this stuff up.

Moving on from disaster, Falcons were a pleasant surprise - if you can even call it a surprise for a team with m0NESY and NiKo making it to the Playoffs of a tier 1 event. They took down SAW and NAVI, only (understandably) losing to Vitality in the seeding match.

Liquid were the big revelation of Group B, showing notable signs of improvement and managing to qualify after the disaster that was siuhy’s first event with the team at PGL Bucharest.

With the Group Stage now behind us, these are the teams heading to the Playoffs:

🇪🇺 MOUZ
🇲🇳 TheMongolZ
🇪🇺 GamerLegion
🇪🇺 Vitality
🇪🇺 Falcons
🏳️ Liquid