Nicolas Perez on Exofeng and Markoon joining G2 NORD’s 2027 roster: “We’re by far the best project in the ERLs”

G2 NORD have their first pieces for 2027. In an interview with DPM Esports, head coach Nicolas Perez, who has himself re-signed with G2 Esports’ academy until 2028, revealed that Mario "Exofeng" Strugov has signed with the team on a one-year deal and that captain Mark "Markoon" van Woensel has extended for two more years. Speaking from his holidays in Japan, in the middle of a war for his next support, Nicolas Perez opened up on the pressure of finally having the resources to win, the bet he made on Markoon despite twenty negative references, the move to G2’s offices in Berlin and his long-term ambitions.

You’re on holiday in Japan and you’re already doing interviews?

That’s it. I even had to stay up until 4 or 5 in the morning because of the time difference with the off-season, but it was planned, I had told my girlfriend it could happen. We’ve been here for two weeks and it’s already happened three times, so I apologize, I’ll bring her a good breakfast in the morning and be a cool guy.

Your role at G2 NORD is head coach. Can you explain what being head coach of an academy team means, and whether you see notable differences with your previous projects, which were almost always first teams?

It’s a super interesting topic, because I had this discussion with Alban Dechelotte, G2’s CEO, where I explained to him that this is the first year I’ll have the responsibility to win. In all my previous off-seasons, I always had the excuse of being low budget: at GameWard we were one of the lowest budgets in the league, and GIANTX were never a high budget either, so my teams have never been top one or top two in budget. 2027 is the first year of my life where we have all the resources we need. There are still ERL teams that somehow manage to pay players more, I don’t know how they do it, but in terms of environment, I sincerely think we have the best in the ERLs and it’s not close: we have the best support staff possible, we’re in the room next to the LEC team, and we’ll do routines with them.

So for the first time in my life, I’m in a position where people expect results. Before, I could be the cool guy finishing third or fourth and saying I didn’t have the budget, but that’s not possible anymore. That’s my role as an academy coach, and it’s something people struggle to understand in the current ERL system. I had a discussion on Twitter with Xenesis (KC Data Analyst), who believed otherwise, but apart from obvious exceptions, I remain convinced that you have to win EMEA Masters to make it to the LEC. Unless something crazy happens this off-season, no ERL player will be promoted to the LEC without having gone through an EMEA Masters final. Xenesis brought up KCB’s 2024 roster as a counterexample, but for me that’s the exception that proves the rule, since those players were promoted internally within the same structure, which isn’t always the case for academy players. I believe someone ran the numbers, and around 85% of the players who made it to the LEC went through an EMEA Masters semifinal, so performing is a necessity, we have no choice.

So for you, developing talents and performing are tied together?

Exactly, you have to perform. That’s also what gives your project credibility: the number of players you send up. I don’t know how this off-season will end, but I hope Toasty gets a chance in tier 1 in NA. It’s on track for now, but you never know, things move fast in an off-season and a Korean coming out of nowhere can take your spot. I hope Shelfmade gets a shot too, once the Naak Nako situation is settled. But typically, players like Carlsen or Kryze have more chances of moving up thanks to their EMEA Masters performances.

I’ve also seen messages on Twitter saying we’re putting buyouts on our players. Obviously, if my player leaves mid-year, I need at least a buyout to get another one, and people need to understand that. If an LEC team tells me in June that it wants my rookie, I have to find someone else for the summer, and other players have a price too, so the buyout usually just breaks even. From one year to the next, buyouts are very rare in the ERLs.

As an academy coach, my role is like any classic coach’s: tie my whole ecosystem to performance. The only difference is that I also have a mediation role with the LEC staff and with the needs of a club that is bigger than my team. Mid-year promotions can happen, and that’s the kind of situation where you have to adapt and be careful. To give a hypothetical example so people understand, if Shelfmade is on my team next year and gets promoted to the LEC mid-year, I don’t just have to find a player as good as him, I have to replace my second German player, the one who allows us to play in the Prime League, so I need an available German top laner. That’s the kind of back and forth between the first team and the academy you have to keep in mind when you build your roster.

You said 2027 is the first year you feel you have to perform. Wasn’t that the case in 2026, when you joined the project?

For 2026, I was originally supposed to go to GIANTX’s academy, that was my agreement with GIANTX. Three weeks into the mercato, they came to me saying they didn’t know whether the Spanish league would exist, so they wouldn’t block me and I should explore my options. A week or two later, Michel, NORD’s CEO, came to me saying they had made a deal with G2 to become their academy team and they were super interested. The thing is, I’m not joking, it was around November 5th, and back then the off-season wasn’t as late as this year. This year is completely crazy: usually everyone is signed before November 15th, and it’s the first time I can remember that barely more than half of the LEC players have verbals at this point.

So we had two weeks to build the roster, and all the top ERL players were locked. That’s when I made the bet to take Markoon, even though he had a very bad reputation after his year at Solary. Starting your discussions with players on the scene with a player who has no team isn’t easy. After that, we took Shelfmade, who wanted to play with him, and we managed to get Rin, who was being dropped by Team Heretics Academy. It was a roster assembled because we needed a team.

For a patched-together roster, what you built last year was pretty good.

I’m very happy, we had a good roster. G2 were incredible on the organizational side, with the apartment and the manager, they did a crazy job. We made all four Prime League finals, four out of four, and at EMEA Masters we had no luck, we drew Solary in the quarterfinals twice in a row. I’m happy with the year, it’s just that a big performance wasn’t part of the initial objectives.

And this year?

This year, I got a little tap on the shoulder: “Nico, now we make four finals, we win three of them, and at EMEA Masters, we win one.”

What’s the project for next year? How will it differ from this year?

We’ve re-signed Markoon for two years. I’m very happy with that choice, I think he’s the player I’ve most enjoyed working with in my entire career. After Solary, I asked around 25 people for feedback. I started with his previous team and got no positive feedback at all. I thought it was bad luck, a bad year can happen, so I asked about the year before, no positive feedback either, and the year before that, same thing. In the end, I had around twenty negative references on him and everyone told me not to take him. I’d never seen that in my life, because there’s always a teammate who will say the guy is the GOAT and that they used to go out for ice cream together. There, there was nothing, so I thought there had to be something I wasn’t getting.

I don’t like playing the off-season negotiation game, so I went to him and said: “Bro, you seem good, but nobody likes you. What’s going on? Explain it to me.” I realized he’s so passionate about winning that he lacks self-control, he doesn’t find the right way to express himself with people, and he’s too focused on what he sees and feels. So I told him I would only take him for 2026 if he did that work on himself and accepted to be my captain. I told him I would tell everyone he was my captain, so he had better work on it, and that if he failed, I would tweet that we had failed together and expose his career if he hadn’t done the necessary work. Three days later, he came back to me and said he was up for the bet. I told him it would be super hard, that I would be on his back permanently about how he expresses himself, the words he uses, his intent in scrims and reviews, that he wasn’t allowed to be late, and he said he was ready. Over the whole year, there were two slip-ups, maybe a two out of ten compared to the feedback I had received in terms of impact, and the rest was impeccable. So we re-signed him for two years, and I told him the next step is to do the same as captain offline, which is harder.

Markoon isn’t really a rising talent anymore, he has a lot of experience on the scene. Do you think he can still make it back to the LEC, or did you take him to lead the group?

I think he has the level for the LEC. This year, we had the chance to scrim LEC teams a lot, and I know people have talked about scrims, but when you’re able to drop 20-plus-kill games against top four LEC teams, it means you can do something. Unfortunately, at some point it becomes a question of age for GMs. I think he turns 24 or 25 next year, I can’t remember anymore, and it’s going to be a growing obstacle, so next year will probably be his last chance, and 2028 his very last chance, and then he’ll have to see what he wants to do with his life. But if Kryze can make it back up, Markoon can too, and Kryze is three years older than him. Papi Faker is showing the world that when you’re good, you can perform at any age. For bottom-of-the-table teams, an experienced profile like Markoon would be the ultimate player to have, because on top of being a captain, he shotcalls the game from A to Z: early game, objective setups, tempo, flash timers. I told my CEO there’s no better jungler in the ERLs, it’s impossible.

Are there other announcements?

Yes, we’ve signed Exofeng for one year. We wanted two years, but unfortunately it didn’t happen, for the sole reason that the ERL system is very unstable for the coming years. His agent was afraid, which is understandable, that the Prime League might not exist in 2028 and that Exofeng would end up with a contract dragging on without being able to play.

So he could stay for a second year if the Prime League remains?

Exactly. Although for 2028 or 2029, I would like to see a change of ecosystem.

If the ecosystem changes, which a lot of people are talking about, you’re in a comfortable position to be part of a potential LEC 2 as G2’s academy.

That suits me. Without flexing, I think that for 2027 we’re by far the best project in the ERLs. By far.

That wasn’t your view last year?

No, we were online. Look at last year’s EMEA Masters quarterfinals: there were only two online teams, us and another one, and everyone else was offline. My job online and my job offline have nothing to do with each other. Online, and I’m exaggerating so people understand, I can be in my boxers, I can tilt during scrims when we play badly. Offline, that’s impossible: you have a coach’s posture to keep, you have contact with your players, and when a guy mocks you, you can look him in the eyes and ask him if he’s mocking you. You can’t have that relationship online, it’s night and day. I don’t know a single coach who loves his job and says he prefers online to offline.

Is that enough to make you the best ERL project? Nobody can compete?

In terms of infrastructure, the only one that could somewhat match us is Galions, but they don’t have an LEC team to work with. What we have is super solid. I don’t know if you saw the information from my CEO, but we’re profitable in 2027, and I don’t think many ERL teams can say that. Above all, it allows us to offer crazy-quality support to our players: we pay for their apartment and their food, public transport will be covered, they’ll have gym access, a performance coach, G2’s support staff, and we’ll do the morning routines with them. It’s a whole performance environment and an insane level of comfort. Our goal is to make our players feel like they’re in the LEC, so that when they get promoted, they’re not surprised.

You’ll be in G2’s offices. Do you already know how much you’ll be able to work with the LEC team?

What’s established is that we’ll do all the morning routines with them, they have a kind of physical warm-up in the morning that we’ll do together. After that, depending on our level, there could be scrims, 2v2s, 1v1s and so on, but it’s a very honest relationship with G2, and the G2 staff told us the same thing: they’re not doing charity. It’s not because we’re their little brothers that Caps will go to my mid laner and tell him “come on, baby, let’s 1v1 this afternoon so you can become a better player”. If it’s useful for them, they’ll do it, because their main goal, before helping us, is to win. So all the 1v1s, 2v2s and scrims will only happen if we’re good, which is also why it’s so important to recruit good ERL players: it unlocks learning dynamics that are super interesting.

I’m a huge fan of diversifying the way you learn League of Legends. People don’t do enough Blitz scrims, for example, and they don’t use the practice tool enough, even though there are tons of things to do with it, with objectives and so on. The problem is that I can’t find anyone to do it with for now. KC tried Blitz scrims a bit this year, but people are still too focused on 1v1s and 2v2s. What I also expect a lot from next year is the relationship with G2’s staff. This year, we already had a weekly meeting on the evolution of the meta and on situations within the team, and they sent us patch updates and interesting soloQ scouting. Next year, I hope I can grab some info while they’re having lunch. As long as it doesn’t negatively impact the LEC team’s routine, a lot of things can be done, because we must never be an obstacle to them winning, and that’s extremely important from my point of view.

An academy team can also shake up the hierarchy of the first team. With players like Exofeng, and Shelfmade if you manage to extend him, could you have real competitors for the roles above?

It has always been a bit tense with G2, in the sense that they’re the best team in Europe. Going from ERL player, or even top ERL player, to top European player, meaning the best in Europe at your position, which has been G2’s dynamic in past years, is a big step. Now, if there’s one year where there could be movement, according to the rumors, it’s this one. If they manage to get Naak Nako, I don’t think there will be much discussion, but if they don’t, we’ll see who they have in top. And obviously, players have this in mind, there’s no point pretending they don’t when they join the project. You join G2’s academy, you see a guy in the first team who’s within your reach individually, you want to eat him.

On top of that, the big value people don’t see from the outside, and that I highlight to players, is the rare scrims and warm-ups we’ll have with them during the year. The following year, you’ll have VODs of yourself against G2 to show to LEC teams, and not many ERL teams have those. This year, for example, Toasty had VODs against G2, MKOI and Na’Vi for his off-season, so around three or four LEC teams, which lets you show yourself against the best players in Europe. That has so much value in an off-season.

What’s your goal when you build G2 NORD’s roster?

Our goal is to send people to the LEC, not necessarily to G2, but elsewhere too. It’s the same dynamic as T1 Academy: if you train your young players well and send them up to the LCK, the level of the league rises, which is good for everyone. At G2 NORD, the mantra is that we want projects that are always competitive, with two or three interesting rookies in the roster, but those rookies have to be good enough to make it to the LEC within a year, because your project needs to gain visibility. We don’t have the luxury of a third division like KC yet, which would give us a complete talent funnel. We want to be attractive in the long run, and after three years in the ERLs, I hope at least four or five players from our team will have been promoted.

What’s your direct role in the off-season? Do you have full power over the choices?

I do everything. “Here’s the budget, good luck!” I ask my assistant coach to watch VODs, I talk a lot with Markoon, whom we signed very early, to get his opinion on players, and I watch VODs, look at stats, do interviews with players, talk to agents and negotiate the money, because even if we have good conditions, salaries are calculated at the German legal level, which is quite high. That’s why I set alarms at night.

Don’t you have to take the main team’s needs into account, in terms of developing certain roles?

Theoretically, we had requests, let’s say indications of what could be good, but given how chaotic the 2027 off-season has been, fewer of them arrived than expected. It’s also my job to make deductions. For example, if G2 have a young, top-tier jungler, is it worth going through the trouble of finding a rookie jungler? No. Same thing in mid: if you’re playing behind Caps, the mid laners you go after need to be players you know can beat Caps. I would have wanted to recruit Panda at the start of the off-season, but unfortunately he absolutely wanted to go to KCB, even though I tried everything. With no disrespect to kyeahoo, who has shown nice things, kyeahoo is more beatable than Caps if you want to get to the LEC, and he also takes an import slot, whereas Caps has signed until 2028 [2027, actually]. I can’t go to Panda and tell him: “Trust me, you’ll take Caps’ spot in 2028.” So I try to juggle that information, because the goal is to be a spare wheel for the LEC team just in case, and to make their job easier in future off-seasons.

So what blocked the Panda deal?

He told me: “I’m KC, bro.” That’s it, nothing more. I already wanted him for 2026, but we didn’t take him because he wasn’t ready enough and we needed to win, as I told you before. I’m happy for him, I think it will be a nice project. But it’s not the same kind of project: if you believe the leaks, they’re already on three or four rookies out of five, and you can’t have a team that is as competitive as Galions, Solary or us with that.

Without revealing too much, are you optimistic for the mid lane?

In the ERLs, mid is easy, you can go shopping, there are five or six names that are easy to get. Tonight, though, it’s war for my support. We have fifteen messages to read. Right now, it’s basically a world war to fight over the supports who aren’t in the LEC, and depending on who gets whose verbal and when, we’ll see if I have to go for my second or third choice. Supports in the LEC are locked at this point, so it has started moving in the ERLs, and we’ll have to see who manages to be the most attractive. I won’t give names, but we already stole one player from Galions this off-season, so maybe we’ll steal a second one, who knows.

Now that you’ve signed for two years at G2 NORD, what’s your long-term personal goal? Do you still enjoy developing young players, or do you miss coaching at the top level and aiming for international tournaments, like you did with GIANTX?

I still have the will to win Worlds, it never leaves my head. Everything I do in League of Legends is aimed at that goal, including my side projects, whether it’s the Discord to help people get into the esports ecosystem more easily, or my project to coach people in soloQ to raise the level of the European soloQ. So eventually, I’ll obviously go back. But for now, I refuse to try to move up to the LEC until I’m 100% convinced I have the skills to manage players with ego, strong opinions and atypical playstyles, profiles like Caps or Inspired who take up space in a team. I’m convinced those are the players you need if you want to be champion, that very few coaches are able to work with them, and that I’m not versatile enough in my coaching yet. Leaving a top project to join a top five or six LEC team? I wouldn’t learn anything more than in the ERLs. Yes, the game goes faster and it keeps me a bit sharper in terms of knowledge, but I watch LCK VODs, top three teams, and that’s enough for me.

In terms of timing, it’s something I told G2 right away, I told the LEC staff last year and I’ll tell them again this year. You often have this cliché of the academy coach who wants to steal the main team coach’s spot. I go to the main team’s coaches and tell them not to worry, I know exactly where I am. Imagine the luck I have: I’m in a club that trusts me, and I can build my own academy system in my image, with my ideas, over the long term. If in three or four years everything is solid, players are getting promoted, and at that point I have the opportunity to become G2’s head coach with my academy system underneath, perfect: I have my foundations, I know all the staff I’ve already worked with on site, and the transition happens super naturally. So it’s an ambition I have, obviously, but not right away.

So you’d rather think long term and take the time it needs?

I’m a guy who builds things. One of my biggest idols in sport is Arsène Wenger, you know what he did at Arsenal? His way of seeing sports management is the way I want to build an esports club.

You’ve also never been in better conditions to learn, being offline with what you consider a top ERL team.

At G2, we have something called the Performance Lab, created by Isma, who is incredibly good. In this Performance Lab, we have experts on every subject, nutrition, sleep, physical, psychological, and so on, whom you can take ideas from. Around a month and a half ago, we had a meeting with the man who coaches the coaches of the top football league, to teach us the pedagogical optimizations they’ve made with the new generation, the TikTok generation, in football: how they keep their attention, how they make learning more engaging and more fun. Bro, where do you find that in Europe, or even in the world?

So concretely, what’s the goal this year for G2 NORD? Winning titles?

Goal number one is the Prime League: we want all of them, every Prime League title. Then, at EMEA Masters, we’re going to win at least one. If we don’t, it will be a failure, and we’ll have to see why. People can quote-tweet this interview saying “Well no, Nico, you didn’t win a single game”.

You said you’re the best ERL project by far, it’s not even close...

In terms of project! Obviously, if LEC players drop down to the ERLs and some teams build super teams, they’ll be tough opponents to beat, especially since we’re in a project where we need at least two rookies. With Exofeng, that’s one, so we need one more. And the rookies I take are “fake rookies”, meaning two or three years of competition at most. If there are super teams of former LEC players, we might not be able to deliver the results I announced with as much certainty, but for me, it’s essential to at least match what we did this year and do better at EMEA Masters.

Would Shelfmade be considered a rookie, if he stays?

This year, I considered him a rookie because he still had a lot to learn. For 2027, if he stays with us, it will be the confirmation year, and I’ll be extremely hard on him if we end up working together, because online it’s complicated to be strict with players, you can’t be on their back. In 2027, if he stays, I’ll be right behind him. And he’s a fake rookie anyway: he’s played nine Prime League finals in two and a half or three years, he’s at home there.

And his situation depends a bit on Naak Nako’s, right?

Exactly, Naak Nako is the first domino for all the top laners. Once he chooses where he goes, the other LEC teams choose their top laner, and depending on that, he could drag interest from teams like Fnatic or Vitality. I don’t know, I haven’t followed the LEC teams’ interests at all this off-season, but I think it will snowball, and there will be deadline wars with every player being told “you sign tomorrow at 4pm” and stuff like this.

Any final words for the G2 fans listening?

For G2 fans, we’re going to try to communicate a lot more next year about the team’s daily life, so I hope we’ll have much more proximity with the fanbase in 2027. I know the French fanbase was a bit disappointed in 2026, since we were very focused on the German fanbase, which is normal because it’s the essence of the project. But for the French fans, we’ll try to give you a bit more to feed on.