Plantronics, creator of high-end PC and console gaming peripherals have teamed up with ESET UK Masters for Season 2! Not only do we have the £10,000 prize pool but we now have some gorgeous headsets for the winners

Prizes Include

• GAMECOM 380:The Plantronics® GameCom® 380 delivers immersive, stereo sound with deep, resonating bass via 40mm speakers. The noise-cancelling microphone kills background noise so your commands are loud and clear.
• GAMECOM 780: The Plantronics GameCom 780 USB headset with Dolby® technologies transforms standard audio into a stunning 7.1 surround sound experience. The noise-cancelling microphone kills background noise so your commands are loud and clear.
• GAMECOM COMMANDER: Victory is yours with the tournament-ready Plantronics GameCom Commander PC headset. With its closed-ear design and unmatched noise isolation, audio, and voice technology, the GameCom Commander shuts out distractions while immersing you in 7.1 Dolby stereo surround sound.

Watch out for the full announcement of Season 2 in the first week of June, and tune in to our weekly broadcasts over at Twitch.tv each week and catch all the best Starcraft 2 action.

ESET UK gave away £10,000 in season 1 of the ESET UK Masters, which saw the epic finals hosted at Insomnia48 in March. Some of the best players in the world faced off in Telford, England and the champion was crowned.

Season 2

Season 2 qualifiers will begin soon online, with yet another £10,000 prize fund available for the championship tournament at the end of the season. This will be in the form of online tournaments hosted over on esetukmasters.com and include open tournaments and invitationals.

We are aiming to have the online tournaments take place on different evenings to the Blizzard World Championship Series so everyone can still take part. Also doing this means you can watch the stream and enjoy the tournaments from home! Watch our awesome casting team of John “JoRoSaR” Sargent, Adam “Madals” Simmons and Kaj “Lyrlian” Landman (and potentially some guest casters!) and catch some of the best Heart of the Swarm action on the ESET Twitch channel.

Unfortunately due to tournament licensing we cannot run the ESET UK Masters Season 2 grand finals at the Insomnia49 event, so we have decided to create a brand new event in September especially for our grand finals, with the venue still to be announced. We will still be hosting a qualifier at Insomnia49 for the Starcraft 2 community, so some spaces in the Grand Finals event will be available for the BYOC attendees. We are still negotiating whether we can have an extra prize pool for this qualifier, but expect an announcement about that soon!

Ladders

One other way you can get involved with the ESET UK Masters is our soon to be launched Season 2 Ladder! Taking place on the esetukmasters site, you will be able to challenge other players on the ladder and see who can be the best players in the community. Earn better seeding positions in our open qualifiers based on your ladder position as time goes on and spot prizes for the most consistent ladder players that play the most games each month!

Make sure you tune in tonight as we have TLR eSports Revolution taking on Edification Empire Spida in a ZvP UK Challenger match.

For the main Showdown we have two top players, Awesome Gaming Fuzer vs Western Wolves Sortof! These guys are battling it out in a TvZ for the lions share of £170!

Make sure you tune in over at our Twitch channel at 19:00 BST, and tell us who you think will win over on the Teamliquid thread.

Season 1 of the ESET UK Masters was an amazing tournament, spanning 3 months, involving 391 players and hundreds of matches, over 270,000 hours of Starcraft action has been viewed by fans around the world (that is THIRTY YEARS of tournament streams!).

There were some great games, players disappointed and players ecstatic. Some, even without winning made a name for themselves and took the Starcraft community by storm. Players who, until recently, were not known well took down mighty names while said legends and frequent winners crushed opponents throughout.

Macro, Micro, harassment and strategic movements shaped the event and eventual outcome. Teams members fell and team members stood in solidarity all with the joint aim of holding the 1st place title (and cheque) above their heads victorious. If you visit our YouTube channel can find many of the best matches from the weekend as well as highlight games from the online qualifiers. Enjoy, learn and prepare for season 2!

Also if you want to see some interviews from our Season 1 finals coverage partner Definitive eSports then check out this playlist from the Season 1 finals. Featuring interviews with Sting, CranK, Snute, TLO and our casters you have hours of content to watch right there!

Once again we have a "between seasons" Showdown showmatch for your viewing pleasure, with the UK only "Challenger" match to warm you up!

Tonight's challenger match will bring AndyPandy against WCS UK Finalist Moomin in a best of 5 where the winner will bag £30. Support the best players in the UK by watching tonight!

And for the main event, we have a crowd favourite Goody facing off against a tough opponent - Minato! Head on over to the TeamLiquid thread and tell us who is going to win these match ups. Your commentators for tonight will be the lovable duo Lyrlian and Madals, who will entertain you for hours of Heart of the Swarm action!

Click me to watch the stream any time after 19:00 BST