“At Reason we’ve always been the underdogs, even when our story started 20 years ago” – Reason Gaming co-owner talks 2025, ambitions and the shifting scene as they launch new Counter-Strike and Apex Legends rosters

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Reason Gaming are one of the most recognisable esports orgs in the UK. For Counter-Strike fans especially, their qualification to Katowice 2014 made them a household name. As the first major with team sticker capsules, EMS One Katowice forever immortalised the participating teams by putting their logos in the game itself. It is fitting then that Reason are setting new ambitions starting with a Counter-Strike roster for 2025.

Built around Reason veterans Fred ‘FincHY‘ Finch and IGL Charlie ‘cJe’ Everitt, the roster is bolstered by former TheLastResort AWPer James ‘Flicky‘ Errington as well as the Ukrainian duo of Vitaliy ‘v1ze‘ Filatov and Mykhailo ‘m1she4ka‘ Sakach. The roster will compete in ESEA Main and UKIC Season 5, initially with a substitute.

And following a new staff announcement and a surprise Apex Legends roster announcement, Reason are keen to make a point that 2025 will be a different year for the organisation, following a relatively quiet 2024 to breaching out into more esports. Darragh Harbinson spoke to Reason Co-Owner Joe ‘RCN’ Tuley to explore the new Counter-Strike roster, how Reason can realise their fresh ambitions, and how esports has changed after 20 years in the scene.

Reason Gaming have just announced their new Counter-Strike roster. How did the roster come about?

We ended up speaking to Fred, FincHY, and he said: ‘I really want to come back to Reason, this is what we are up to. Me and Charlie (CJE) are back.’

I said: ‘Okay, get a team together and we’ll see what we can do.’

Because I like fostering UK talent more to see where they go with that. Obviously, it’s harder nowadays to get sponsors and stuff, so we know full well that the backing is going to have to come from our investment or what is left in the business, so I said: “Get a roster and take it from there.”

Fred came to me with different rosters over time [laughs], so we finally managed to secure who we have now.

That’s where it started really. It wasn’t our plan, in all fairness, to come back to CS, until later on this year. We were aiming to look at different teams in different areas, but we decided to come back a little early to see if we could foster UK talent.

So, is it the case that they constructed the team and came to you with it?

Yeah pretty much. It started with that original chat and it went on from there. We’ve had different people in the roster in all fairness. The roster changed a lot at the start of December, and finally, we managed to secure Flicky, m1she4ka, v1ze but CJE and FincHY were the key two in the roster at that period of time. So it was an interesting communication, I’ll tell you that.

What was the initial plan for the roster?

I can’t discuss too much about the original roster, but the idea behind it was to try to secure more UK players. We ended up obviously going with the Ukranians instead. It was a weird change I suppose. They had originally wanted to go with who they were playing with, then they started to trial players and working with these guys and they saw some good results, so it’s an interesting one.

Is it right to say the players felt like they would be more successful with the Ukrainian players?

Yes, and time. I think time is an issue at the moment. When it comes to UK CS, everyone has a full-time job or a part-time job. They’ve got other areas to focus on. With this roster, yes they’ve got jobs but they’ve been able to sort it out to play those games that need to be played a 9:00 AM on a Tuesday, so they can go through that and navigate that struggle.

So some of the things we’re trying to involve the team in, like United21 that’s the plan because some of these games are played at really strange hours. It’s hard to find a UK roster that can do that. I hope these guys can give it a go and see what happens.

What’s your overall ambition for Reason in Counter-Strike in 2025?

At Reason, we’ve always been the underdogs, even when our story started 20 years ago now. We’ve always been the underdog and fostered some talent and made them better than they originally were.

So we’ve heavily invested in some strategy pieces, understanding from the coaching level on how to play better. Our plan is over time to keep this roster, but try to get into more invited tournaments and leagues, and hopefully from there branch out.

I’m not going to say a major, because that would be amazing to bring Reason back to a major, but who knows what the future holds?

You mentioned coaching. Is that something you’re looking for with this team?

Yeah, they’ve been looking at a few options. Personally, someone that we used to work with – Monsalve – was going to join the roster, but sadly got a better roster, which is fantastic for him. He said he’d still try to help the roster as much as I can but I’m working for another team. So we are looking towards other coaches, and trying to bolster the roster more. I know the guys are looking for coaches themselves.

I suppose with this article, if anyone with a track record in coaching fancies it, please do apply. We’d be happy to hear your thoughts!

You had the Reason Gaming ‘Byfield’ roster that broke up last year, then very briefly had the ‘bevve’ roster. From a CS fan perspective, maybe Reason haven’t achieved as much as the brand would want. Why is 2025 going to be different?

Last year, we went back to the drawing board. That’s why we’ve had a bit of a hiatus in regard to news articles and content on social. We’ve invested a bit more into our infrastructure and how we deal with things.

I’ve stepped up doing more on the business side to get through some difficult times in esports with some partners. We’ve looked at it from the ground up and worked out where we want to sit. We’re introducing a new team to socials and new managers which will hopefully bring Reason to the fold again.

It’s a very difficult time in esports. I thought 10 years ago when I started my own team, London Conspiracy, that it was an easy ride. Now, it’s a different beast because players’ contracts demand more every year, and now I think we see they are going down a little bit in terms of monthly salaries. If we had a top 16 team in Valorant, they’d still be asking a silly amount of money a month. But I suppose it proves their worth, and seeing what social media they have and where we get engagement there.

Back in the olden days, that was next to nothing. Now, we’re really heavily focussed on different processes internally and hopefully, staff and members of core management can help us get to the places we need to go.

What are the ambitions that you would like to achieve? (editor’s note: this interview was conducted shortly before Reason had announced their new Apex Legends team)

We’re heavily involved in Street Fighter, and we’re looking to pick up different rosters in different games at the moment – looking towards the amateur level with a view to grow from there. In regards to CS, I want to send them to as many places as we can.

We won’t be doing Epic.LAN this month sadly, just due to planning of the team – some of them have trips and God knows what else. But hopefully, towards the back-end of the year, we’ll try to get back into Epic.LAN with hopefully a view to do some domination in the UK Circuit (UKIC).

Season 5 is coming up, and with the team, we have a slot there. That’s the plan. Do well in those, show what we are about in the UK and hopefully secure some decent partnerships along the way.

I wanted to ask you about the recent news regarding Into the Breach ceasing operations. How might that affect your business or how people see UK esports?

I was looking through HLTV earlier this morning. Just looking at what our story was at Reason. Some of the comments when we picked up karrigan were so negative in regards to UK CS and a UK organisation picking up this roster and all the rosters back in the day. We can probably see that now as well.

I think the UK has a lot to give. Shoutout to different organisations like Endpoint doing their thing – I know [Endpoint COO] Peter Thompson very well – and I applaud that. (editor’s note: this interview was conducted prior to Endpoint announcing they were pausing their CS team operations)

I know we’ve had some difficulty in the last week with ITB but we’ve been around 20 years now.

Maybe the last couple of years we’ve been a bit quiet, a bit stagnant, but I feel 2025 is going to be the year where we branch out into some major competition whether that be CS or a different game or genre.

Reason, Endpoint and others have created programs for content creators. What do you offer content creators and what value does that have for your org?

So Reason Live came about at the same time a lot of people were doing influencer/affiliate programs. Hopefully, something we do a bit differently is it’s more of a personal and community base. Every single influencer we have on the books, whether they’re small, micro, or macro, will engage in each other’s streams and chat, so we have a whole different channel talking about going to IEM Katowice this week with four members of Reason influencers going there.

We offer incentives, like if they get certain amounts of viewers on the stream they win prizes, one of the streamers won a few jerseys and accommodation paid for Kato. That’s something we try to incentivise. Not normally based on metrics, but rather engagement in the community and such. That’s something we try to do differently.

We work with different sponsorships and partners. Some of the merch we bring out will be aimed at creators first, so that’s kind of an interesting mix. We’ve got this whole community now where anyone can talk to anyone. I feel that’s growing quite rapidly.

We started with five applications and we picked two people out of that. Now we’re sitting on 30. It’s not a massive jump, but we really do hand-pick the people who apply and make sure they fit with everyone else. We’re really trying to build a family which is nice and we’re trying to keep that community going.

How do you feel about the general esports scene in terms of securing sponsorships?

I think most non-endemic brands are still kind of navigating the esports space, understanding what it actually is and probably, sadly, have already been burned by some of the big boys. So they’ve constantly put money into a business or esports team and not seen a return.

So we try to look after similar business sizes, look at start-ups, and introduce a really small package to begin with. The good thing about us is that we’re quite loose when it comes to contract terms, which is why we spin through a few different sponsors every year but it helps us navigate and find different markets.

Some of the markets we’re looking at are sports supplements. Trying to look at the psychology side of things and improve our players’ mentality with some sports supplements. There are so many different avenues, and trying to navigate that space at the moment… I think it’s a normal thing at the moment. Businesses are really buckling down in where they put their pounds or dollars so we’ve really got to find unique ways for them to part with them.

One of the things we did last year was with ‘Holy’. They sent a CS team to Insomnia. The idea behind it was that we’d sample test with some of the community inside Insomnia. So little things like that are where we try to add a little bit of added value and get them on board.

It’s a difficult time in regards to esports sponsorships and partnerships, but we should be okay and we should be getting through it.

Overall, what do you think is going to set Reason apart in 2025?

New staff. New structure. I think that’s it for us and, of course, the teams we have at the moment. As I said, we’re partnering with new people, new teams and stuff. Not aiming completely at CS.

Another thing is education. We’re actually working with a local college, so we’re actually integrating into the esports curriculum and offering some students opportunities work experience, as well as playing for Reason under our banner at a more amateur level. So, looking at the British Esports Student Champs and that’s pretty much it. So hopefully by the end of September, we’ll get our own under 16 or 16-18 team in Valorant or Overwatch.

So that’s the idea. We are the underdogs, we want to offer opportunities for different people. That’s what we’re about – so it should be a good year.

Darragh Harbinson

Darragh Harbinson is a freelance writer specialising in Counter-Strike. He has written for Esports News UK as well as the likes of UKCSGO, Dexerto and Rush B Media.