The NLC has this morning lost its accredited EMEA Regional League (ERL) status, as part of Riot Games’ sweeping changes to European League of Legends for 2023.
The Northern League of Legends Championship (NLC), the ERL for the UK, Ireland and Nordic countries, will now become a non-accredited ERL, meaning the number of teams in NLC Division 1 should drop from ten to eight.
However, Maximilian Peter Schmidt, director of League of Legends Esports, EMEA, told Esports News UK in a press conference this morning:
“We’ve been working very closely with the teams themselves to ensure that there is an option on the table where we would continue the NLC as a non-accredited ERL but maintain ten teams, provided all ten teams are able to participate and continue in the 2023 season” – @RiotMAXtheX
— Esports News UK (@Esports_News_UK) November 18, 2022
And Freaks4U said ‘the decision depends on the feedback from the teams’. A few team sources told Esports News UK they disputed Maximilian’s quote, saying Riot/Freaks4U haven’t been working closely with them on this.
There will still be two splits and one Pro-Am tournament (the Aurora Open, recently won by Dusty), but prize money and NLC financial stipends will be reduced from €200k to €45,000, meaning there will be €155,000 less for teams. Each team will apparently see their stipends reduced from €14,000 per year to €2,000 per year, with prize pools looking like €10,000 for Spring, €10,000 for Summer and €8,000 for the Pro-Am.
The NLC said that Division 1 will remain, and for the lower divisions, “we will work out a solution within the next weeks”.
The NLC will also have ‘downscaled broadcast, media content and coverage’.
In another change, Malta has been added to the NLC, bringing the total number of countries eligible to participate in the league to eight: UK, Ireland, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Iceland and Malta.
A spokesperson told Esports News UK: “We added Malta to the NLC to ensure any aspiring LoL Esports professional in the country can benefit from our residency status policy and compete freely in any ERLs and/or LEC.”
The NLC’s format will change too. Non-accredited leagues run with a four-team knockout stage, whereas accredited leagues use a six-team, double-elimination format. And according to Riot’s info from last year, these leagues will not have an offline event.
Regardless, the NLC Summer finals event had no audience, so the region has already missed out on the big physical events other top ERLs have had like the French LFL and Spanish Superliga, whether finals or showmatches, prior to this morning’s announcement.
It’s the lower financial stipends and potential removal of two team slots that will arguably frustrate team organisations the most, particularly those who were looking to buy a slot from one of the many outgoing NLC orgs, but were not aware of the changes up until the announcement.
Esports News UK understands that existing NLC teams were officially told in a call one hour before today’s 9am GMT press conference, while broadcast talent were not informed prior to the announcement.
One NLC team owner told Esports News UK anonymously: “The league is actually dead. It’s been killed, it’s been murdered.”
“Riot has unleashed the final bullet from the chamber upon the struggling tired race horse. In the words of Nietzsche, the NLC is dead – and we have killed it.”
Anonymous NLC org owner
Another source commented on the non-accredited league status: “It’s a little sad to be honest, and I think it will actually kill UK League.”
An additional source said they were told there is a “pathway to accreditation” for the NLC but it ‘solely depends on the profitability/sustainability of Freaks4U, and nothing to do with the performance and/or investment of the teams’.
A spokesperson told Esports News UK: “We work very closely with Tournament Organisers (TOs) to continuously review the status of our ERLs. Currently, there are no further changes in accreditation status planned for 2023.”
EU Masters (now EMEA Masters) slot distribution will be changed, but the structure won’t change. The NLC will now have two EMEA Masters slots, rather than three. You can see the full EMEA Masters slot distribution rundown in this article on the LoL Esports website.
Essentially, it seems Freaks4U is asking teams to invest more time, resources and money than they did this year, so that the NLC can become a sustainable product.
Separate to team organisations, the manner of the announcement and people being left in the dark has also caused problems for players.
For example, for some players who chose to join the NLC over another accredited region like the LFL or Superliga, not knowing the NLC was about to be demoted to a non-accredited league, this news will now of course impact them and their negotiations between teams.
It’s going to be a hectic ERL off-season now for some, as teams and players adjust to today’s news. And as we said, broadcast talent were left in the dark:
Speculation has been rife this month as rumours have flown around, leaving many confused as to the future of the NLC, and the scene a little divided and in disarray – something that has seemingly been the case for some time now.
The whole situation is typical of the NLC and exemplifies the poor level of communication surrounding the NLC since Freaks4U came on board as organisers, with grassroots LoL leagues being shut down and NLC rule changes being made last minute, much to the frustrations of some teams.
One source added: “The UK needs to band together. If communication is not there, we’re fucked. The whole ecosystem is fucked for the next two years.”
We have also seen the erosion of UK League in general, with fewer teams turning up at LANs, the identity of UK orgs lacking, as stated by DonJake, caster and owner of NLC Division 3 org Ruddy Esports.
It’s a real shame, given the quality of the NLC broadcasts, the talented casters and players this region has, its consistent performance levels in the EU Masters, and the fact that NLC has reported some solid viewing records.
The NLC was first announced in April 2020, with DreamHack the organiser. Prior to that, we had the UK-specific UKLC, and other UK LoL tournaments like the Forge of Champions, ESL Premiership and FourNations, as well as the UK Masters.
Riot last made a major update to ERLs around a year ago.
If two teams drop out of the NLC, who will they be?
Today’s changes have raised some questions.
It’s unclear which two teams may drop out of the NLC Division 1, and how this will be decided.
The NLC had three EU Masters slots (now known as the EMEA Masters, more on that below, but this has now been lowered to two).
It’s unknown if the NLC will still have five divisions or not – more from the NLC in the section below.
Maximilian Peter Schmidt, director of League of Legends Esports, EMEA, told Esports News UK in a press conference this morning: “On the details, our partner Freaks4U will communicate with the teams as soon as possible with all the details and how this will affect them.
“We’ve been working very closely with the teams themselves to ensure that there is an option on the table where we would continue the NLC as a non-accredited ERL but maintain ten teams provided all ten teams are able to participate and continue in the 2023 season.”
What the NLC said: ‘Even though this decision is very hard for us, we are fully committed to offering an enjoyable league for teams and fans’
“When we took over the NLC at the end of 2021, we decided to aim high,” the NLC said in a statement on its website. “As such, we made significant investments to ultimately reach those high standards of an accredited ERL and to further improve quality, reach and relevance.
“With regards to the NLC broadcast, we feel we have achieved this as is reflected by the extent to which our audience grew over 2022. As a result, we hoped to be able to maintain our momentum into 2023 and attract new commercial partners.
“We tried our best throughout the year but sadly, we did not hit our partnership goals due to the current market situation. As such, it is no longer financially viable to continue at the level at which we have been operating. Therefore we have to take a step back for 2023 to establish an alternative path to lead the NLC into the future.”
NLC statement
“We explored various options, but unfortunately, it became apparent that our most viable avenue was to downscale and become a non-accredited ERL. While some parts of the process are still being worked on, this is the preliminary structure for the NLC in 2023:
- Division 1 will remain
- For the system below Div 1 we will work out a solution within the next weeks
- 8/10 teams (decision depends on the feedback from the teams)
- 2 Splits and 1 Pro-Am tournament (the Aurora Open)
- Prize money and stipends reduced from 200k to 45k
- Downscaled broadcast, media content and coverage
“Even though this decision is very hard for us, we want to assure you that we are fully committed to offering an enjoyable league for both teams and fans. In addition to this, we will continue our discussions with Riot Games and possible commercial partners within the region to come up with an upgraded concept from 2024 on.”
Reaction to NLC becoming a non-accredited ERL
We’ve rounded up a host of tweets from the community in this Twitter Moment:
LoL ERL list for 2023
| Accredited ERLs | Non-accredited ERLs |
| Superliga (Spain, Andorra) | NLC (UK, Ireland, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Malta and Iceland) |
| Prime League (Germany, Austria, Liechtenstein, Switzerland) | PG Nationals (Italy: Holy See (the), San Marino) |
| TCL (Turkey Championship League, Türki̇ye, Azerbaijan, Mongolia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan) | EBL (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Hungary, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Slovenia, Kosovo, Moldova) |
| LFL (France, Monaco) | Greek Legends League (Greece, Cyprus) |
| Ultraliga (Estonia, Georgia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Ukraine, Israel) | Hitpoint Masters (Czech Republic, Slovakia) |
| Elite Series (Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg, (incl. Caribbean Dutch Islands, Aruba and Curacao) | |
| LPLOL (Portugal) | |
| Arabian League (Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Palestine, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates) |
What are the other changes Riot is making to European LoL for 2023?
While it may not be rosy for UK League of Legends right now, it’s not all doom and gloom when looking across the wider European LoL landscape.
Riot Games has today also revealed new plans for League of Legends esports in Europe and Middle East and Africa (EMEA), marking the start of the second decade of its existence.
The plans include key changes to the League of Legends EMEA Championship (LEC) and the merging of Europe, Türkiye, CIS and Middle East and Africa (MENA) to become a single competitive region: EMEA.
Through these changes to the ecosystem, LoL Esports ‘aspires to become the future of sports in EMEA and to enhance the level of competition in the region’, according to a press release.
“Today, we’re excited to reveal our plan for the next decade of LoL Esports in EMEA and the changes we’re bringing to the LEC and wider ecosystem to continue offering a best-in-class experience to our players.”
Maximilian Peter Schmidt, Riot Games
It will aim to give more players a path to the renamed EMEA Masters (EM) and the opportunity to showcase their talent to teams in the higher-tier LEC. It will also present fans across EMEA with ‘even greater opportunities to watch elite level competition and look to unite fans across EMEA through their love of the sport’.
“Over the past decade, our team has worked tirelessly to create an industry-leading esports ecosystem. Today, we’re excited to reveal our plan for the next decade of LoL Esports in EMEA and the changes we’re bringing to the LEC and wider ecosystem to continue offering a best-in-class experience to our players”, said Maximilian Peter Schmidt, director of League of Legends Esports, EMEA.
“We’re focused on offering our players the best competition possible. These changes will further enhance the opportunities for professional and aspiring LoL players in the region, giving them more avenues to reach the elite level of competition in EMEA.”
The key changes to the LEC and wider ecosystem from 2023 include:
TLDR: LEC in 2023
- The LEC will be renamed the League of Legends EMEA Championships and will undergo a season overhaul, with format changes to the competition itself, and the introduction of the LEC Season Finals
- The competition will take place across three splits: Winter, Spring, and Summer, with Winter Split and Spring Split taking place prior to MSI, and Summer Split and the LEC Season Finals taking place following MSI and prior to the League of Legends World Championship
- Each split will begin with a single, best-of-one round-robin competition. This will then be followed by a best-of-three double-elimination group stage featuring the top eight teams, before concluding with a four-team, double-elimination best-of-five playoff stage
- The season will culminate with the LEC Season Finals, which will feature the best six teams from the entire season – with split winners qualifying automatically – and the best teams in the competition qualifying for Worlds. The LEC Season Finals will also feature a roadshow event on the final weekend of the competition
TLDR: EMEA Ecosystem and ERLs overview for 2023
- Europe will merge with Türkiye, CIS and MENA to become EMEA; a single and united competitive region for LoL Esports creating a multi-tiered esports ecosystem ‘that sets the bar for excellence in competition and entertainment’, says Riot
- The unification of the region will see the TCL (Türkiye Championship League) and AL (Arabian League, previously Intel Arabian Cup) join the newly renamed ERL (EMEA Regional League) circuit
- EU Masters will transition to become EMEA Masters (EM) – a pan-regional competition – giving more teams from across the new, unified region the opportunity to qualify and participate in the tournament and offering players the opportunity to showcase their talent
- The changes mean all players that have residency status in Europe, Türkiye, CIS and MENA can compete freely in the LEC and won’t be subject to the Interregional Movement Policy, offering aspiring pros in the region more pathways to reach the LEC
- The LCL will remain suspended until further notice. Riot will continue to monitor the landscape and assess the possibility of including the league in the expanded ERL ecosystem at a later date
Do you have an opinion on the news today? Please tweet or DM Esports News UK on Twitter, we’ll aim to run a stream analysing and talking through everything tonight or tomorrow evening at twitch.tv/esportsnewsuk from around 9pm GMT
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.
