Listen to the audio version of this article (generated by AI).
NLC 2025 news and content powered by AGON by AOC
Nord Esports, one of the teams taking part in the UK and Nordics Northern League of Legends Championship (NLC), have announced an eye-catching 2025 roster.
The veteran team features 25-year-old UK ADC xMatty, who previously played in the UK circuit with Fnatic Rising back in the day, before winning back-to-back EMEA Masters with Karmine Corp and playing in the LEC for a short while with Team BDS.
He returns to the UK scene after a stint with Unicorns of Love: Sexy Edition, with whom he won the Prime League.
His team also includes 31-year-old Hungarian top-laner Vizicsacsi, who has represented Astralis, BIG and more in the past, and 27-year-old Danish jungler Santorin, the former Dignitas and Team Liquid LCS player who returns just over a year after retiring from pro play.
Rounding off the team is 28-year-old Swedish support player Treatz, who has competed in the LEC with SK Gaming and the LCS with Immortals, and Dignitas (as a coach), plus 32-year-old German mid-laner and popular streamer NoWay, who recently played with NoNeedOrga (NNO).
xMatty said: “Going to be a banger of a split, the NLC is so back.
“Playing with and against some huge names – can’t wait!”
Vizicsacsi said: “Extremely excited about the project! We are coming for the title.”
Santorin added: “I AM BACK! I definitely missed playing competitive, so I’m grateful for being able to get to smurf it up with these beasts.”
The players are joined by coaching staff including UK head coach Just Jon, who has plenty of experience over the past decade with Excel Esports, Munster Rugby Gaming, Solary and more. There’s also UK team manager Rydona and French head of League of Legends Peña.
Rydona has been managing teams for about five years now, having won the UKEL with Hyve in 2021 before working with Lucent and Nativz, where he won an NLC split and went on an EMEA Masters run.
They also have assistant coaches Kiao (Poland) and Sollaw (France), plus performance coach ScottyMcScoot (Denmark) and analyst Sennen.
Nord Esports to share ‘almost everything’ about their coaching process in 2025 NLC
Like fellow NLC org Los Ratones and their choice to make scrims public with another big-name roster, Nord Esports are also planning to make a lot of their behind-the-scenes activities public.
They will share written updates, summaries, plans, live scrims, coaches perspectives and more.
Just Jon said it’s going to be a fun split.
“We’re going to do things in a new way, and we’re going to show you more behind the scenes than anyone else has ever done!” he said.
Nord played a few scrims already, including a 5-0 vs UK org Ruddy.
Other teams are starting to announce their rosters, like Rich Gang. We’ll aim to do coverage of UK angles and perhaps a roster roundup featuring all the teams soon.
Caster Nymaera also commented on the big NLC rosters on Reddit: “Dude, what did the NLC sacrifice to have this sort of off-season? This is the largest set of high exposure moves in any ERL ever at this point.”
This comes after he made a longer comment about the NLC hype for 2025 here:
‘The future is bright, but we will have to work hard to reach our goals’
Michel Klepper, the co-founder of Nord Esports, told Esports News UK about the thinking behind this roster.
“It was always clear to us that a mix of high caliber players and influencers was the way to go for esports teams,” he said.
“With the recent uprising of influencer teams across Europe, the ERL scene is now in a good state to allow us to fully benefit from such a project, while it wasn’t the case before.
“Our recent success hosting the NNOCup, fuelled by our excellent relationship with NoWay and his team, made it obvious that we were a good fit for each other. We also think that he brings a different vibe to the already existing influencer rosters in NLC.
“Doing something a bit different than the others was an important condition for us and NoWay meets it perfectly. He is a gentleman on and off the rift while also being a really good player, while we always wanted to mix high performance with good hearted and reassuring values.
“Every single player in this roster also fits this vibe. They’re great players and great guys and most of us have been watching them throughout their careers while dreaming to be able to work with them one day.
“The future is bright but we will have to work hard to reach our goals.”
Find out more about Nord Esports’ background in our interview with co-founder Michel Klepper from 2023 here, and our interview with xMatty from 2022 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.
