The 2022 VRL Finals' group stage came to an end this Sunday, paving the way for this week's playoffs.

Due to the absence of a CIS team, the Finals' group stage adopted the same format as the VCT EMEA Promotion's group stage. Group A maintained the original, planned GSL format, while Group B pivoted to a three-team round-robin stage.

Case Esports Case Esports Inactive breezed through the competition in Group A, getting the better of EXCEL EXCEL Inactive Moe40 Muhammad Hariff chiwa Egor Stepanyuk paTiTek Patryk Fabrowski Foxie Tyler Lowton ALIVE Gilad Hakim and TENSTAR TENSTAR Inactive Buld Michał Sokal kacpi Kacper Wolski maniek Jakub Mańkowski Stix Wojciech Chamielec to qualify atop their group. Team Vitality Team Vitality Europe Rank #5 trexx Nikita Cherednichenko Derke Nikita Sirmitev Kicks Kimmie Laasner Sayf Saif Jibraeel Less Felipe de Loyola Basso later eliminated EXCEL in the elimination match, afterwards sweeping TENSTAR with an eleven-round comeback on Bind to qualify in second from Group A.

In Group B, Team Falcons Team Falcons Inactive were quickly eliminated from playoffs contention, as Angry Titans Angry Titans Inactive ngiN Engin Kor HyDrO Lukas Brill and FUT Esports FUT Esports Europe Rank #8 xeus Doğan Gözgen MrFaliN Furkan Yeğen yetujey Eray Budak AtaKaptan Ata Tan qRaxs Doğukan Balaban secured 2-1 and 2-0 wins, respectively. In the final match to decide who'd move on in first place, the Turkish champions secured a bumpy 2-0 win over the DACH representatives.

The four playoffs team now get a day's rest, as the VRL Finals resume Tuesday, August 2. While between Stage 1 and 2, teams were fighting for two slots in the VCT, this time they'll be fighting for the title of VRL Champions and the largest slice of the €150,000 EUR.

The first round of the VRL Finals playoffs is: