Mark your calendars, kids, because we're back. Time to show your girlfriend the Intel Extreme Masters European Championship schedule and tell her you're not available for her between January 21 and 24.

The European Championship will be almost identical in structure to the Global Challenge in Dubai - so 16 players in four groups of four (best of 3 format), weeded out to 8 players in a single elimination bracket (best of 5 format).

But barring the absence of American players in Cologne, I think we will have a more sprayworthy tournament than the one in Dubai:

1) Dubai had three tournament days - the European Championship will have four, portioning the action in more healthy helpings and allowing more of the enjoyable "in between" discussion and analysis.

2) We will be showing every match of the event. That goes with the exception that the last round of play in every group will be played concurrently - in such a case we will run a "conference" and try to bring you the action from both games.

3) We will have more matches than in Dubai - we will need placement matches for 5th and 7th place because the top 6 players from Europe will be winning berths to the Intel Extreme Masters World Championship ( rapha, DaHanG, chance and Vo0 are already qualified.)

4) Cologne will have a prize purse increase from Dubai's $6,500 to $9,000. The Intel Extreme Masters World Championship will have $20,000. (We do concede that in the historical context the prize purse may be seen as modest.)

5) The winner of the event will receive a platter very much like this one:


Photo: Julia Christophers, ESL

6) We have done some genetical engineering and altered the DNAs of 2GD and Joe making them even better shoutcasters than they were in Dubai.

7) Cooller.

For all the above reasons, I think that it's in your best interest to spend four days of your life enjoying the tournament on ESL TV. Here is the schedule:

Thursday:
14:00 CET to 17:20 CET - Group A matches
18:20 CET to 21:40 CET - Group B matches

Friday:
14:00 CET to 17:20 CET - Group C matches
18:20 CET to 21:40 CET - Group D matches

Saturday:
13:00 CET - quarterfinal
14:00 CET - quarterfinal
15:00 CET - quarterfinal
16:00 CET - quarterfinal
17:00 CET - placement / World Championship qualification match
18:00 CET - placement / World Championship qualification match
19:00 CET - placement / World Championship qualification match

Sunday:
12:00 CET - semi final
12:40 CET - semi final
13:50 CET - bronze medal match
14:50 CET - final

Where do you find us?

ESL TV has all the streams (incl. the high quality Premiun stream) and will have VODs later on.
IEMtv on Twitter will remind you about all the broadcasts and schedule changes.
The Intel Extreme Masters website has got all the news, galleries, brackets and demos.
Carmac on Twitter will give you short updates and interesting bits of info.

What can you do for us?

We want to and will be able to keep supporting Quake Live as long as we are supported back by the community. Regardless of what you do and what your agenda is - if you love the game, then please help us.

Please spread the word about the stream and the event to your friends on FaceBook, retweet IEMtv and Carmac on Twitter and make sure that anyone you think might enjoy it watches! MAKE IT BIG!

Questions:
1) Will strenx choke again?
2) Will Cooller win a major title after three years?
3) Which of the players in the event have a fighting chance to win the platter?
4) Who will be the biggest choke?
5) Who will be the dark horse?
6) Will you be spreading the word?
7) Will you be spraying cum everywhere?