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It was a moment for contention when the Call of Duty League announced that Major IV would take place behind closed doors in Columbus, Ohio. Since the New York Subliners dropped their hosting of the event, the League was forced to scramble to find a location that could accommodate a CDL Major, and ultimately, it settled on a crowdless LAN. Now, the LA Thieves have won Major IV, but for some, it didn’t even feel like a true, honest Major event.

Regardless, it’s a monumental win for the LA Thieves, and it’s the team’s first victory since winning the CDL Championship at the end of last year. Once again, OpTic Texas failed to close out the series, ending up in second place once again despite a monumental run. For this event, OpTic Texas was the odds-on favourite to win, having landed a perfect 5 – 0 record in qualifiers, but by the time the dust had settled, the boys in green had failed to secure the bag.

Image Credit: Call of Duty League

With a qualifying stage that saw the LA Thieves beat almost exclusively bottom-of-the-table teams, nobody really thought the squad had the momentum to close out the Major. In the run-up to Major IV taking place, OpTic Texas was white-hot, sitting on a record-setting Hardpoint win streak and almost refusing to drop a single map all through the qualifiers. It looked to be game over when Thieves sent OpTic Texas into the lower bracket, but after handing Atlanta FaZe a sizeable donut, OpTic was back in the running.

But it wasn’t to be, and despite remaining resolute in its abilities as a team, OpTic Texas just couldn’t piece it together in the Grand Final. As the LA Thieves closed out the series with a final round of Control on El Asilo, the crowd remained silent… Because there wasn’t one. That was the worst thing about this Major – there was nobody there to witness it, and the behind-closed-doors setup felt like another day in the office, and not a $500,000 Call of Duty League Major.

It was a mixed bag, overall. It was a moment that saw the Subliners prove they were still capable, landing a fourth-place finish. It was also where the Royal Ravens showed their colours, being the only team to not secure a single map in the Major, which pushed Matthew ‘Skrapz’ Marshall to take to social media to air his grievances.

Atlanta FaZe also had a decent run, steamrolling over Surge, Ultra, and the Subliners, all before falling to OpTic Texas. There was nothing groundbreaking or intensely memorable, though – it was ‘just another Major’, by the end of it.

Now, we move to Major V, which is being hosted by Toronto Ultra. It’s the last chance for teams to lock in their qualification for the Call of Duty League Championship, which will see just eight teams take to one of the grandest stages in esports, live in Las Vegas.

There’s one team that everybody wants to make it to the event, and that’s the Vegas Legion. During the Major IV qualifiers, Legion put up a massive 4 – 1 record, making it into the winner’s bracket for the first time in franchise history. It was all she wrote for the team though, as the Subliners sent the Legion into the lower bracket, and the Florida Mutineers sent them home. On the board, the Legion now sits at 130 points, 20 below Minnesota Rokkr and the cut-off for qualification.

At present, it’s Legion, the Mutineers, Guerrillas, and the Royal Ravens that won’t be making it to Champs. For the latter three teams, qualification is almost impossible, and only a perfect stage followed by a win at Major V might redeem them. For Legion, it isn’t off the table just yet, and an epic, monumental run could push them into the Championship.