LEC 2022 Spring Split to start season remote amid rising COVID-19 numbers

With the start of the LEC mere days away, the league announced that the Spring Split will begin remotely. The matches will take place as scheduled however they will not be held in the LEC studio located in Berlin, Germany. Teams will stream games from their own facilities similar to Splits past.

In the official statement, the league cited ongoing restrictions and rising COVID numbers as reason behind its decision. Since the prevalence of the Omicron variant, most of the world has seen an uptick in COVID cases. In only one day, Berlin reported more than 60,000 cases. Only months ago, the ongoing pandemic seemed quite manageable as cases were on the downtrend. Now, the LEC must respond to new returning regulations.

In the announcement, the LEC made it clear that the health and safety of its players remained the league’s top priority. “Our first and foremost priority is always the health and wellbeing of the players, coaches, team personnel, and staff,” the announcement wrote, “To achieve that and ensure the continuity of the league itself, teams will compete from their own training facilities for the being of the split.”

There is some hope that teams will eventually play in-person once again. For the 2021 Summer Split playoffs, players competed in the LEC arena for the first time that year. Though 2022 will initially see a return to online play, that does not mean the 2022 LEC season will exclusively happen online.