ECS have announced the start of Season 3, with open qualifiers for the developmental league starting as soon as next week.
Esports Championship Series, a league organised through partnership between FACEIT and Twitch.tv returns with its third iteration. The organisers have announced that the open qualifiers for the ECS Developmental League will commence as soon as Saturday, February 18th. There will be a total of four qualifiers across a period of two weeks. Matches will be best-of-one, up until the quarter-final bracket of the qualifier.
Said qualifiers may be found below (all times expressed in CET):
Saturday, February 18th - Qualifier #1
European Qualifier #1
14:00 - Matches commence
Matches will conclude once bracket reaches round of 32.
North American Qualifier #1
07:00 - Matches commence
Matches will conclude once bracket reaches round of 32.
Sunday, February 19th - Qualifier #1
European Qualifier #1
14:00 - Matches commence
Round of 16 till conclusion.
North American Qualifier #1
07:00 - Matches commence
Round of 16 till conclusion.
Saturday, February 25th - Qualifier #2
European Qualifier #2
14:00 - Matches commence
Matches will conclude once bracket reaches round of 32.
North American Qualifier #2
07:00 - Matches commence
Matches will conclude once bracket reaches round of 32.
Sunday, February 26th - Qualifier #2
European Qualifier #2
14:00 - Matches commence
From round of 16 till conclusion.
North American Qualifier #2
07:00 - Matches commence
From round of 16 till conclusion.
The top two teams from the four open qualifiers will advance to the ECS Developmental, where they will face four invited teams in best-of-two matches. Of the eight contenders, the top four (two from each region) will go on to face relegated teams from ECS Season 2 (
Virtus.pro, 
Fnatic, 
Team SoloMid and compLexity Gaming) in best-of-five series to secure their placement in Season 3, where they will have the opportunity to face the recent major Champions, 
Astralis, 
FaZe Clan, Cloud9 and 
OpTic Gaming. Additionally, teams that qualify for the third seasons are presented the opportunity to opt-in to a co-ownership stake in the ECS league.
Below is a preliminary schedule for the ECS Season 3 Developmental League:
February 28th - March 16th - Opening round
Best of two matches, four qualified teams and four invited. Top two contenders proceed to ECS Promotional Playoffs.
March 25th - March 26th - ECS Promotional Playoffs
Best of five matches between top two contenders from opening round and ECS Season 2 relegated teams ( Virtus.pro, Fnatic, Team SoloMid and compLexity Gaming). Victors qualify for ECS Season 3.
Images courtesy of ECS
