ESEA announced the 42nd season of their league

The official ESEA twitter account announced the 42nd season of the league.

Teams currently registered for Season 41 must wait until all matches of the current season have been completed before they are promoted to the appropriate division, able to pay for the new season and add new players to their roster. This process should take place on July 18, at the start of the official player break.

Season 42 will consist of six regular season weeks as we try to complete the last two seasons of 2022 before the end of the year. This will allow us to avoid overlapping with the official player break in 2023. Teams will need 3 wins to keep their place in the higher division i.e. Intermediate, Main or Advanced.

Register for ESEA League Season 42 today to:

• Win your share of $210,000 in prizes across North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Australia/New Zealand, South Africa, and Latin America North and South.
• Start your journey to the ESL Pro League by working your way up to the ESL Challenger League. Protect the integrity of your matches with the leading anti-cheat client.
• Enjoy peace of mind on 128 tick servers around the world to guarantee you a great connection.
• Play two matches per week for all divisions in the regular season.
• Get advanced stats, boxed scores and heatmaps for your matches.
• Use the automated veto process to draw your strongest cards before the game starts.
• Complete web-based match scheduling with SMS alerts to help you track and stay on top of your schedule.
• Use the tutorial system to allow the sixth team member to access your game server.
• Get support from a team of experienced staff with years of tournament management experience.
• Watch GOTV replays available after each match or live GOTV broadcasts with unlimited viewers.

Don't forget that you can use the recruiting section to find teams and players.

Again, players with a League Pass membership will not need to pay their membership fees separately, as they are included in their membership.

Registration for the ESEA League closes on the evening of August 1, 2022 at midnight PT

Make sure all your players/coaches/staff are on your team's page by this time and it is registered in the League. New teams will no longer be able to register and roster restrictions will take effect from that point on. For example, "One player can only join one team in 7 days" and "A team can only add 3 players in 7 days". So if you add 3 players on the night of the league close, you won't be able to add new players until 7 days have passed since the first player of those 3 joined. Similarly, if you join a team on the night of the League's registration close and then leave, you will not be able to join another team for another 7 days after the League's registration closes. Since registration closes on the 1st, if a player joins on the 31st, they will have to wait until the 7th to join their next squad. Similarly, if 3 players joined on the 1st, the team will have to wait until the 8th to add players after registration closes.

Unpaid teams will be removed on August 3, 2022 at 1:00 AM PT.

Make sure 4 players either have a League Pass membership or have paid their league dues by this point. If your team does not currently have 4 players marked as paid, they will be removed and will not be able to enter the season again at this stage.

This season we have added a small fee for players in the Latin America Open, Latin America South/Brazil Open, South Africa Open and Middle East Open tournaments. This is done to improve the quality of competition in the League by reducing the number of teams that register and immediately drop out. League players can cover this fee by purchasing a three-month or longer membership through Steam and using ESEA Points to do so.

Schedules released August 3, 2022 at 9:00 AM PT.

As always, we are posting schedules with some time to allow teams to veto and familiarize themselves with the schedule interface. At this stage, teams will be able to see their upcoming matches, veto and schedule their first week matches.

First day of default: August 8, 2022

Since this season briefly coincides with the summer break for players, teams may cancel their first week of the season by stating in the comments on the match page more than 24 hours before the match that "they are unable to participate at this time due to the break". The teams will then have to mutually find a new time during the season to play the game.

The default days/times listed in the league rules will apply from this date onwards, so teams should be prepared to play on those days if they can't find a common time.

Final roster lock: September 4, 2022

Lineups will close 2 weeks before the end of the regular season. Once this happens, the player rosters will be final for the playoffs, so be sure to add alternates to your teams in case of any personal or technical issues that will affect the rest of your season, including the playoffs and any relegation matches.

End of regular season and start of playoffs: September 18, 2022

All regular season matches in all divisions must be completed by the evening of September 18 in order to start the playoffs. Unplayed matches that have not been completed by this point will be randomly voided, unless one team has clearly spent more time trying to find time.

Playoffs end: October 9, 2022

At this point, all playoff matches will be completed and we will be able to start processing the prize money, which will be available for withdrawal within 45 days of the team's split/confirmation report being sent.