New Irish esports organisation Nativz Gaming have re-signed Demb as first team coach and Sjaku as academy coach on year-long contracts.
Nativz are owned by Kurt Pittman and Eugene O’Brien, who have also launched NFT-focused business Big Fan Collectibles. This business has just partnered with Irish streamer Bosch Merchant and also has links with Nativz (more on that at the bottom of this article).
The Nativz org have most recently been playing in the Telia Esports Series Denmark 2021 Summer season, where they finished top of group B and were knocked out in the semi-finals by eventual winners Absolved.
Nativz have a mix of Danish and Icelandic players, as well as British top-laner Only Angel who is based in Manchester. The rest are scattered across Finland, Croatia, Denmark, Iceland and Germany.
Although headquartered in Ireland, Nativz Gaming launched in May 2021 with their League of Legends first team playing in the Telia Esports Series Denmark and a League of Legends academy team in the Diamond Series Denmark. In their inaugural season, both teams reached their respective playoffs.
“With a strong start to our performance, taking first in regular and third in playoffs, I’m excited about the opportunity to build on our competitive success in the year to come.”
Demb, Nativz Gaming
Nativz say that Danish coach Demb was ‘instrumental in pulling together and leading the first team through their group stage’.
“With a strong start to our performance, taking first in regular and third in playoffs, I’m excited about the opportunity to build on our competitive success in the year to come”, said first team coach Demb.
Academy team coach Sjaku led the side to finish top of group two with just two losses. They ended up bowing out of the Diamond Series Denmark Masters in the quarter finals,losing to Damwon Mercedes.
With Riot Games’ recently announced League of Legends esports restructure for the UK and Northern Europe, Nativz say they’re now building up towards the seeding rounds, with the coaching team’s preparations already underway.
There’s more info including player profiles on the Nativz Gaming website.
Nativz’ NFT link with Big Fan Collectibles
Big Fan Collectibles is an NFT-focused business with the same owners as Nativz Gaming: Kurt Pittman and Eugene O’Brien.
Big Fan Collectibles has partnered with Irish streamer Bosch Merchant, who has more than 50,000 followers on Twitch and partner status with the streaming company.
Bosch’s venture into NFTs will see his first release within the Big Fan Genesis Series. There will also be NFTs from Nativz Gaming too.
All fans that purchase from the Big Fan Genesis Series stand to benefit from exclusive access to events in virtual locations, exclusive discord channel and social content, airdrop NFT gifts and limited merchandise offers.
Nativz’ collection arrives on Thursday August 26th and Bosch Merchant’s will launch on Friday August 27th.
There’s more info on www.bigfan.io and the Big Fan Discord channel here.
Dom is an award-winning writer and finalist of the Esports Journalist of the Year 2023 award. He graduated from Bournemouth University with a 2:1 degree in Multi-Media Journalism in 2007.
As a long-time gamer having first picked up the NES controller in the late ’80s, he has written for a range of publications including GamesTM, Nintendo Official Magazine, industry publication MCV and others. He worked as head of content for the British Esports Federation up until February 2021, when he stepped back to work full-time on Esports News UK and offer esports consultancy and freelance services. Note: Dom still produces the British Esports newsletter on a freelance basis, so our coverage of British Esports is always kept simple – usually just covering the occasional press release – because of this conflict of interest.
