ESL changes qualification process for Pro League

ESL has announced changes to the ESEA MDL Global Challenge event. ESL has changed the direct avenue for European and North American teams to advance to the league through the MDL grand finals. Previously, the winners of the MDL grand finals would advance into the Pro League, and MDL would take place before the Global Challenge. This is no longer the case. Now,  the MDL grand finals and the Global Challenge tournament will be combined. The top two teams of the event will advance to the Pro League.

North America also will have three teams this year instead of four like before. This means North American competition will be more fierce in order to qualify for Pro League. This spot removed from North America has been given to the APAC region.

The reason for these changes is due to the way Vitality handled the Global Challenge last year. They had already qualified for the ESL Pro League through the MDL grand finals, making them very lax in their play at the event. These changes are in the hope that this will not happen again.

Eight spots will be available in the ESL Pro League divvied up like so:

• North America - 3
• Europe - 3
• Australia - 1
• Asia-Pacific - 1