ECS S2 Finals viewer's guide

ECS Season 2 Finals brought six of the top ten teams to Anaheim, including last week's ELEAGUE finalists Astralis and OpTic, and two who are sitting at 12th-13th place, Immortals and Envy.

Two teams will attend the event with stand-ins. After releasing Lincoln "⁠fnx⁠" Lau, SK will be using Ricardo "⁠fox⁠" Pacheco in California (as well as at the ELEAGUE Major), and Valdemar "⁠valde⁠" Bjørn Vangså will be standing in for Emil "⁠Magisk⁠" Reif, who skipped the tournament due to school commitments.

Group A	Group B
Astralis	SK
Cloud9	Envy
FaZe	Immortals
OpTic	Dignitas

The eight teams have been distributed into two GSL groups according to their placement in the online part. The upper half of the group will feature best-of-one matches, with elimination matches and deciders played in best-of-three series.

Today's matches will be played without live audience, from Saturday on the competition will move on to the stage at the Anaheim Convention Center & Arena.

The full schedule is as follows:

Friday, December 9th
20:15	Astralis	vs. OpTic	BO1
21:30	FaZe	vs. Cloud9	BO1
22:45	Group A winners' match		BO1
00:00	SK	vs. Dignitas	BO1
01:15	Immortals	vs. Envy	BO1
02:30	Group B winners' match		BO1
Saturday, December 10th
19:15	Group A elimination match		BO3
22:15	Group B elimination match		BO3
01:15	Group A decider		BO3
04:15	Group B decider		BO3
Sunday, December 11th
20:15	Semi-final #1 (B1 vs. A2)		BO3
23:30	Semi-final #2 (A1 vs. B2)		BO3
03:00	Grand final		BO3

A nine-man talent lineup will bring you the action at ECS Season 2 Finals, including Tomi "⁠lurppis⁠" Kovanen who will return to the ECS analysis desk alongside a duo of former players, Janko "⁠YNk⁠" Paunović and Robin "⁠Fifflaren⁠" Johansson.

Sue "Smix" Lee - Stage host

Paul "ReDeYe" Chaloner - Desk host

Tomi "⁠lurppis⁠" Kovanen - Analyst

Robin "⁠Fifflaren⁠" Johansson - Analyst

Janko "⁠YNk⁠" Paunović - Analyst

Henry "⁠HenryG⁠" Greer - Commentator

Matthew "Sadokist" Trivett - Commentator

James "JZFB" Bardolph - Commentator

Daniel "ddk" Kapadia - Commentator

ECS have not revealed the distribution of the $750,000 prizepool.

Lucas "LucasAM" Aznar Miles wrote up a preview of the event, in which you'll find some of the key storylines and analysis of some of the groups' match-ups.

HLTV.org will have a two-man team on-site at ECS Season 2 Finals to bring you full coverage of ECS Season 2 Finals, including galleries and interviews.