The Electronic Sports World Cup (ESWC) organiser, Games Services, has announced details regarding the seeding, format and schedule of its 2008 finals, which are to be held at the Nvision conference in San Jose, USA, in just over a weeks time.

The male Counter Strike 1.6 teams, of which there are 40, have been divided into four seperate groups according to perceived skill. There's a top, high, medium and challenger pool with eight teams in the first three and the remaining teams placed into the bottom pool. The competition will be divided into eight groups of five teams, where two teams will proceed to the second group stage.

Among the top seeds include reigning champions PGS-MYM, a name brokered in the deal which allowed the Polish team to attend the event despite not qualifying through traditional means. Other top seeds include the South Korean eSTRO, Made in Brazil (MiBr), fnatic and KODE5 winners, mTw.AMD, who finished second at last years event.

SK Gaming make a return to the tournament after winning the Swedish qualifier, beating fnatic in their local final. The team missed last years tournament when fnatic and Begrip qualified; Ninja's in Pyjama's (NiP) were also invited as a replacement team when Lunatic-Hai and mugNmouse pulled out of the event.

SK failed to make it to the play-offs on round difference and controversy ensured when Sebastian 'gosey' Selin, SK's former CS coach, argued that the second invite, the first replacement team being H2k from Denmark, should've went to SK and not NiP.

'NiP to ESWC – Blague De Ouf', gosey's blog, was slammed emphatically by the community, as being biased, in a debate lasting over 400 comments. He insisted that SK were more deserving of the spot, despite NiP finishing third in the qualifier, because of a better recent record (both in games against one another and in general), a harder [ESWC qualifying] group and better achievements. Concluding the blog with - “everyone also knows that SK can't afford missing ESWC and ESWC can't afford missing SK.”

Teams who didn't make the top set include the reigning World Cyber Games (WCG) champions, emuLate, as well as team Alternate from Germany.

Male Counter Strike 1.6:

Top seeds
eStro (South Korea)
Fnatic (Sweden)
Made in Brazil (Brazil)
PGS-MYM (Poland) - Reigning champions
mortal Teamwork (Denmark)
mousesports (Germany)
Roccat (Finland)
SK-Gaming (Sweden)

High seeds
Alternate (Germany)
emuLate (France)
Eyesports (Russia)
Frag eXecutors (Poland)
pro100 (Ukraine)
Team Dignitas (United Kingdom)
wNv (China)
x3o (U.S.A.)

Medium seeds
Dragon (China)
Evil Geniuses (U.S.A.)
LowLandLions (Belgium)
Mafia of Brothers (U.S.A.)
Millenium (France)
Motus (Canada)
Nfaculty (Germany)
Vatos Locos (Greece)

Challengers
Assassin List (U.A.E.)
Defining Stars (Portugal)
Incredible (Pakistan)
Libya CS (Libya)
Make it Happen (Ecuador)
Mindless (Venezuela)
Name (Tunisia)
Nice One (Venezuela)
Punto.CL (Chile)
qTp (Panama)
Speeder (Japan)
Team 34 (U.S.A.)
Winners (Tunisia)
Xuxan (Peru)

Female Counter Strike 1.6:

Top seeds
EHONOR (China)
emuLate (France)
Les Seules (Sweden)
SK Gaming (U.S.A.) - Reigning Champions

High seeds
badGirlsclan (Spain)
forZe.female (Russia)
mousesports (Germany)
Nasty (Brazil)

Challengers
Be Eezy (U.S.A.)
Evil Geniuses (U.S.A.)
n!faculty (Germany)
Shara.Bros (Russia)
Strong Ladies (Chile)
Synonyme Intelligence (Venezuela)

There are no surprises in the female competition as reigning champions, SK Gaming, are among the four top seeds in the 16 team tournament. Other top seeds include last years runner-up, EHONOR, from China.

Les Seules from Sweden, who recently won the ESWC Masters tournament in Paris, beating SK Gaming in the final, are also invited. Third place finishers from the aforementioned 'Masters event, emuLate, are the fourth team in the top set. The French team won the event in 2006 under the Be The Best (BTB) organisation and recruited one of last years winners - 'missharvey' who moved to Europe and was unable to continue playing with SK Ladies.