ESL have announced today a new event for the top teams competing in their European National Championship tournaments. The National Championships are the top level national leagues in each European country, which include the UK and Ireland’s ESL Premiership, who’s Summer Season concluded last weekend with Endpoint lifting the trophy. The first iteration of the ESL Pro European Championship (EPEC) is set to be held between October 13th-14th in Poznan, Poland for the four strongest teams from the National Championships. As part of this, Endpoint and fish123 have been handed invites to the online qualifiers for the tournament.
The competition will be a four team €70,000 (~£62,600) event, and will offer a spot in next season’s MDL relegation tournament for two teams that reach the final. Assuming the tournament continues, unlike the previous Clash of Nations tournament, where an Endpoint mixteam headed up by Owen “smooya” Butterfield finished in second place. With the event being held in Poland, the champion of the Mistrzostw Polski (Polish Championship), AGO, have received a direct invitation to the tournament. This leaves three spots available to be secured, with the qualifiers being held on August 28th-29th.
The teams in the qualifier will be the champions from each of the nine different countries or regions (excluding Poland), and the runners-up of the strongest four, which includes the UK / Ireland. The qualifier itself will be in two sections, the first being two round robin groups with six teams each. The top three from each of those groups would head onto a final group stage, where the top three teams would then move onto the LAN in Poland. The teams in the online qualifier are:
| Poland | Germany | France | UK / Ireland | Spain | Southeast Europe | Italy | BeNeLux | Turkey |
| Team Kinguin | EURONICS | aAa | Endpoint | TBD | Nexus Gaming | Forge | Defusekids | No Quarter Cartel |
| TBD | LDLC | fish123 |
Inside of the tournament announcement was the launch of a new way of securing a spot in the MDL Relegation tournament for Season 30. This will take the form of an online competition known as the “Climber Cup”, where the highest ranked team from a National Championship without a spot in the ESL Pro League, MDL or MDL Relegation already under their belt will take part. Full information on this and the EPEC, including the online portion’s schedule, can be found on ESL’s announcement post on their website, or directly through each National Championship website.
