Second season of ECS Counter-Strike league confirmed for October

Following a successful debut season, The Esports Championship Series (ECS) will launch Season Two of its Counter-Strike: Global Offensive league on October 7, 2016, organisers FACEIT announced today.

A familiar format will see 20 CS:GO teams going head-to-head—ten from North America and ten from Europe—and the tournament will hold its first ever open qualifiers for teams interested in joining the ECS. That last part is of course great news for potential emerging talent, which will see prospective inductees compete in four rounds taking place between August 5 to August 27.

Winners of each qualifying round will join up with four invited teams within each region’s ECS developmental league; with the top two teams there competing against the bottom two of last term’s ECS Season One. Finally, the two winners from each region’s promotion matches will join the remaining eight teams from Season One to form Season Two.

If you think you’ve got what it takes, you can sign up by heading this wayif you’re based in Europe, or this-a-wayif you’re based in North America.

In praise of this year’s open qualification format, Michele Attisani, FACEIT’s CBO, said: “The open qualifiers will provide new teams the opportunity to showcase their talent to the world and join our top CS:GO esports league.

"It’s our goal to provide new teams a chance to be recognized in the community and become stars, while providing current ECS teams a fresh pool of talent to test their skills against.”

The ECS will provide a sum of $1.75M for Season Two that’ll “go toward the league’s prize pool and supportive funds that will provide player stability,” so reads an official statement.

Round one of Season Two kicks off between October 7-9. For more information on the ECS itself, including schedules, head over to its official site.