Over a month ago GamerLegion announced their academy project, and now the team has been finalised with a UK player on the server.
Oliver “leaf” Jackson, who has played religiously within the UK scene alongside Ryan “dox” Young for the last three years, on teams such as Vexed Gaming and Coalesce, will now be making the progression into Europe. Oscar “LVN” Levin stated in an interview with UKCSGO that “there’ll probably be one UK player in the academy roster when it gets announced,” and that player is now confirmed to be leaf.
leaf has been a prominent figure in the UK scene over the last few years., most recently playing for Coalesce. With the organisation leaf and company won EPIC.LAN 38 and made deep runs in online tournaments such as CCT West Europe Series 3, plus back-to-back top-four finishes in ESL Premiership despite being dropped by the organisation – the latter being on LAN. He will now be taking up in-game leading duties for the first time, having previously left calling to dox, which makes sense as he is the most experienced member of the new lineup.
leaf winning EPIC.LAN 38 with Coalesce
We have seen more and more British players follow in the footsteps of recent Blast Fall Finals winner William “mezii” Merriman and go to play in international lineups. Mason “Vacancy” Haines recently went to Sprout Academy, Sebastian “volt” Maloș in the main GamerLegion roster, Cai “CYPHER” Watson moved to TSM after the Into the Breach major run, Jack “Gizmy” von Spreckelsen played for both the Prodigies and now Monte Gen, and now leaf to GamerLegion Academy.
Alongside coach LVN (and the main team’s coach, Ashley “ashhh” Battye), he will have a familiar face from the UK scene in the form of Rūdolfs “rud” Osmanisrud. The Latvian had a short stint with Tom “arTisT” Clarke‘s crew on SOS, but was dropped from the team when they signed with Viperio. The team will also have Estonian representation with Andreas “aNdu” Maasing who has come off a very successful stint in sYnck boasting a 1.21 HLTV rating. Continuing on the theme of success, on the back of a win in ESEA Advanced Jakub “nestee” Lempart will be bringing some experience to the team, and finally, the squad will be rounded out with Czech youngster Filip “darber” Böhm.
LVN commented:
“The process was around a month / 6 weeks and had about 500 applications overall. As for leaf, I knew when I started I had to have a U.K. player involved, and leaf was the perfect guy to get in with his age and experience, as well as picking up the IGL role for the team.”
leaf playing for Ex-Coalesce at ESL Premiership Autumn LAN Finals
GamerLegion Academy will be:
Oliver “leaf” Jackson
Filip “darber” Böhm.
Andreas “aNdu” Maasing
Jakub “nestee” Lempart
Rūdolfs “rud” Osmanisrud
Oscar “LVN” Levin (Coach)
Anton “HJELM1” Hjelm (Assistant Coach)
