Die Millennium Series hat sich der Kritik am Spielsystem der Semi Pro League angenommen. Statt der bisher nur acht Teams werden nun jeweils die besten beiden Teams jeder Gruppe (sprich 16) in den Sundays Club kommen. Dazu die Aussage der Millennium Series Organisation:
After the SPL meeting in Paris at the end of January, some of you expressed concerns about the qualification system for the SPL and the number of games/playing time per team in general.
Responding to these concerns the scheduling department has come up with an improved scheme for the SPL:
1. Not only the top team in each group will advance after preliminaries, but both first and second place in each group, just like in the CPL.
2. For these 16 teams advancing, there will be an extra round on Sunday morning, cutting down the number of teams from 16 to 8.
3. With these 8 teams the regular schedule will be carried out, just like in the CPL.
For this improvement on behalf of the SPL teams, the whole tournament schedule has to be rearranged. Other activities originally scheduled on the two centre fields on finals's day have to be relocated. There are no time
buffers left now on the centre fields on final's day, but the schedule will work, if all the involved SPL teams will set-up strictly on time before each game, so that there will be no delays.
For the first event of the MS in Toulouse, we will go with this improved schedule in order to give the best possible value to the SPL teams.
Please note; the extra round will raise the paint consumption for the 16 teams advancing as well.
After the first event the MS will re-evaluate the schedule, and will decide on the SPL schedule for the rest of the season based upon the experiences in Toulouse.
By responding to the demand of the SPL teams for doubling the number of advancing teams, the MS wants to underline its dedication for the whole new SPL approach in Europe and its commitment for the teams and players in general.