Rumours have been rumbling around esports lately that Youtube has agreed a deal with ESL to exclusively stream the ESL Pro League. This has now been confirmed and both the ESL Pro League Season 5 and Season 6 will only be available to view in English via Youtube.
Other language broadcasts including French, Russian, Portugese and Polish, will still be available on other platforms such as Twitch and more.
Ryan Wyatt, Global Head of Gaming Content at YouTube stated: “YouTube is happy to announce our partnership with WESA to distribute the upcoming seasons of the ESL Pro League. Entering their 5th Season, ESL’s ability to continue to produce the highest quality content at the pinnacle level of competitive play is unrivalled.
“Professional Counter-Strike fans and viewership has been growing at such an explosive rate and we are excited to continue sharing this passion with our gaming viewers.”
Season 5 of the Pro League gets underway in the next few weeks on February 7th. From the sixth season all content content will be presented in 1080p @ 60fps, with DVR functionality.
Esports Insider says: This has been coming and a lot of people won’t be too pleased. This is highly unlikely to be the last exclusive streaming rights deal we see in 2017 however so people may have to get used to it.