ESL, DreamHack, and the Counter-Strike Professional Players’ Association (CSPPA) established a participation framework today for professional CS:GO players in the ESL Pro Tour, the circuit that links all of ESL and DreamHack tournaments in 2020.
The parties involved called it the “first-ever framework agreement of this sort in esports.” The CSPPA will be working directly with ESL and DreamHack to administrate the ESL Pro Tour, define players’ rights and obligations at those tournaments, and will try to make ESL’s conditions the standard for other tournament organizers.
ESL and DreamHack will have to maintain its standards, which includes travel and accommodation for seven members per team, private practice hotel rooms for each team, and more.
The CSPPA will elect their representatives for the ESL Pro League player council, which will have an active voice in the league’s administration. The CSPPA will also have a stake in business revenues for now on.
The CSPPA has seven players on its board: Astralis’ Andreas “Xyp9x” Højsleth, MIBR’s Epitácio “TACO” de Melo, mousesports’ Chris “chrisJ” de Jong, Team Liquid’s Jonathan “EliGE” Jablonowski, Evil Geniuses’ Tarik Celik, OG’s Nathan “NBK-” Schmitt, and Jordan “n0thing” Gilbert.
Ulrich Schulze, ESL’s senior vice president of product, said that it was ESL’s priority to ensure that the company provides the best structure for the pros. “The natural extension of this effort is recognizing the CSPPA as a partner in improving the ESL Pro Tour,” Schulze said. “This partnership is a very important milestone for us, as well as a big step forward towards the future of the industry.”
The framework agreement is effective and the CSPPA will start collaborating in ESL’s first event of the season, IEM Katowice, which will start on Feb. 25.
