Fos,
I think Schnowzer is pretty close to the truth. The EK recruitment team are very experienced. They hire hundreds and hundreds of pilots each year. They know what they want. EK has struggled to find pilots on many occasions, but still has not lowered the bar in quality of the pilot, but have lowered the hour requirement.
When you arrive for interview with Ek, you basically have the job, unless you can't fly or get along with the other kids in the group.