UKEL 4 Nations 2025 update: Teams, casters, format, new staff and 1v1 Side Select Duels announced as Winter season gets underway
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The UK Esports League UKEL 4 Nations 2025 esports tournament series has announced a series of updates to mark the start of its latest season.
New teams join UKEL 4 Nations 2025 as Maltese org Project Eversio acquire Verdant’s spot
Division 1
The ten teams are 200 Bandits, Belfast Storm, Brod & Friends, Eversio, Good Chi, Nuclear Vikings, Paragon, Rize Gaming, Team Vertex and Venomcrest Serpents.
Maltese org Project Eversio – with an all-Maltese roster – have acquired their Div 1 spot from Verdant.
In terms of a Maltese org playing in a UK league, it’s in line with the league above the UKEL (the UK and Nordics NLC), which allows UK, Ireland, Nordics and Maltese players to compete. Maltese orgs are eligible to join any NLC national league, including the UKEL, plus the leagues for Denmark, Sweden, Finland and Norway.
Two teams also qualified from the promotion tournament: 200 Bandits and Brod & Friends.
And Ruddy Esports vacated their spot, to be replaced by Rize Gaming as the third seed from the promotion tournament.
Division 2
Division 2 has expanded to ten teams ‘to accommodate the increasing number of talented players and competitive rosters present in 4 Nations’.
These ten teams include Anständig, Int Quick (a streamer team coached by Whatley), Nativz Academy, Cymbal, Good Chi Infernus, Team Chungus, 5v45, DMG Esports, R3volt and Inari.
DMG Esports were relegated to Division 2 via the promotion tournament, and Verdant Bloom and Emrys Esports have vacated their spots.
The news comes after the open qualifiers saw a record 53 teams taking part.
UKEL 4 Nations format changes: Three seasons, fearless grand finals and more
Like the LEC and NLC above it, the UKEL will now adopt a three-split year, each with a league stage, playoff stage and promotion stage.
- Winter 2025 will run from January 20th to March 27th
- Spring 2025 will run from April 14th to June 22nd
- Summer 2025 will run from July 14th to September 22nd
The grand finals of each season will also adopt a fearless draft, where, once a champion is selected, it becomes unavailable for both teams for the remainder of the series. This means that with each game, 10 additional fearless bans are added. The typical 10 bans from the pick/ban phase will remain intact, ensuring no repeat picks.
Each Split will also feature an Open Qualifier for entry into Division 2. And organisers said they’re exploring the idea of adding further divisions.
New 1v1 ‘Side Select Duels’ have also been introduced.
“These are our way of determining which team will hold side selection for any League Stage Match. Simply put: it’s a 1v1 between a player from each team, with the winner earning the right to choose their preferred side in the upcoming match,” the UKEL said.
The UKEL is the first league in the official EMEA ecosystem to have 1v1s for side selection.
Side Select Duels will be broadcast and results will be made available via UKEL’s tournament sheets.
There’s more info on the UKEL 4 Nations 2025 format here:
UKEL 4 Nations 2025 caster line-up announced
The UKEL has also today announced its Winter 2025 broadcast talent line-up.
Temporal is on board as talent lead, with hosts Dalax, GreyHart, Joy K, Jreal, MaskedSwan, Orbital and Trajan.
The play-by-play casters are Thousand Eyes, Alsike, BennisTheMenace, BrackishBrit, Drake, Dubbyking, Luna, Mile, Sophia de Ipanema and Sovonix.
And the colour casters are BlackBloxer, Docda, Frisky, Pietro Castellani, Karvis, Pidde, Pivotless, Recollect, Rev, Rob Loweth, RoryB, Shibby and Zathdos.
Co-streaming and player POV streaming in the UKEL
Starting in Winter 2025 season, organisers are allowing 4 Nations teams to co-stream their matches, and players to stream their own POV gameplay.
“We are making this change to provide Teams with more opportunities to produce content and build their communities,” the UKEL said.
“And players will be permitted to stream their POV gameplay provided they adhere to the rules established in the Official Rulebook.”
New staff join UKEL
“2024 didn’t go quite to plan, and much of that was down to being understaffed in key areas, so we’re taking a step in the right direction by bringing on some new staff to fill those gaps,” the UKEL said.
Tom Keirnan of PR agency The Story Mob will now be the main point of contact for external entities or media outlets getting in touch with the UKEL.
To be clear, the UKEL has not hired The Story Mob – Tom will be helping out as an individual.
The UKEL has also brought on new staff in Social Media Management, Community Management, Broadcast Production and League Operations, with specific names to be announced.
Update: Viewership was also up after day one.
Get more UKEL esports news here
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