ESL and CSPPA release statements regarding the new Pro League structure
Dillon Bantel
ESL Pro League
ESL has issued an apology to EPL teams that were cut due to the league restructure.
ESL has issued an apology to EPL teams that were cut due to the league restructure. ESL announced on Friday the 24 teams that were invited to take part in the new ESL Pro League Season 11. The invites showed that only 24 teams would be in the ESL Pro League in 2020 opposed to the original 48 teams. This left ESEA MDL winners and EPL Season 10 teams without a spot in the new league.
After the announcement, ESL received immense amounts of backlash in regards to the new structure and the poor communication the league had with competing teams. ESL Senior Vice President of Product, Ulrich Schulze, released a number of tweets addressing the issue and apologizing to teams. Here are his statements:
Ulrich Schulze
Senior Vice President of Product
We apologize that we have not conducted the process up to the desired standards. We got it wrong by not letting affected teams know further in advance that significant changes were coming, including the number of teams playing. While several important elements of the league's structure were unknown until last week, the teams were not given enough notice. We did not engage with the affected teams enough to understand how we can preserve the value the EPL slot held for them. We have reached out to all teams and are going to speak this week to make sure that we can address their concerns to the best possible extent.
A statement from the Counter-Strike Professional Players' Association (CSPPA) also followed this apology with a press release after being criticized for not helping protect the teams affected by this decision in a Twitter thread. Section five and six of the press release states:
CSPPA
However, there are business decisions and commercial aspects of such leagues/tournaments which the CSPPA cannot dictate. This includes the number of participants in a TO's league/tournaments, the composition of teams, the way in which the TO enters teams into its league and the way in which the TO handles communication in this respect. These dynamics reflect the state of the current competitive CS:GO ecosystem and that league/tournament negotiations are complex and commercial collaborations between three autonomous parties - the TO, the teams and the players as represented by the CSPPA.
We are disappointed with the way ESL has handled their communication of the EPL changes. We have been working hard to keep the leagues and tournaments as open as possible, and have been and will continue to do our utmost to ensure that the affected players will have the best possible opportunities to qualify for EPL and other leagues.
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