ECS qualification system revamped for S5; dates announced

FACEIT has announced changes to ECS, replacing the Development League with a Challenger Cup to make the qualification shorter and open to more teams.

As a part of previous ECS seasons, FACEIT held a season of Development League before the main competition to decide which teams which would join CS:GO's best. Each season's Development League started with open qualifiers and a BO2 round-robin group stage followed, which meant that the qualifying process was a pretty long one.

The ECS Development League was replaced by a Challenger Cup

For 2018, the process of qualifying for ECS will be changed, with the Development League concept being scrapped and replaced with a Challenger Cup. The cup will be more in line with qualifiers we see nowadays, allowing teams to compete on a more condensed schedule.

Any team will have a chance to compete in the ECS Challenger Cup by playing the ECS Open Qualifiers, which will start on January 27 in Europe and North America.

In addition to EU-wide qualifiers, Europe will also have some Open Qualifiers restricted to teams from specific regions, such as CIS or North Europe. In both Europe and North America, a total of 16 teams from Open Qualifiers will make the Closed Qualifier, from which the top four will advance to the Challenger Cup.

The ECS Challenger Cup will, therefore, feature four teams that fought all the way through the open stage, as well as two invited teams and two teams that finished at the bottom of the table in the past season of ECS. The Challenger Cup will be played out using a double-elimination BO3 bracket, with the top two teams advancing to ECS Season 5.

Find the dates for the competitions below:

CIS/Russia Qualifier: February 3, 2018 (2 qualifying slots)
North EU Qualifier: February 3 2018 (2 qualifying slots)
West/Central EU Qualifier: February 4, 2018 (2 qualifying slots)
South/East EU Qualifier: February 4, 2018 (2 qualifying slots)
EU Open Qualifiers: 5-15 February (8 qualifying slots)
EU Closed Qualifier: February 16-18, 2018

NA Open Qualifiers: February 3-11, 2018
NA Closed Qualifiers: February 16-18, 2018

Signups for the qualifiers will be available here.