It’s been a wild week for Northern Gaming, as the drama surrounding Bird was brought to light and their European team was dropped from the organisation. I bet they wish they could Jason Bourne it - just change your name and leave it all behind.

The European section of the organisation, Northern Gaming Blue, has been the quiet twin since the double signing of NG Red and NG Blue. They’ve also been the less successful twin, which may explain the lack of noise about the team, but was not indicated as the reason for being dropped. The team itself will continue playing under the name Bringos, using that name in the most recent GosuGamers EU Weekly.

CEO of Northern Gaming, Mack Maring, highlighted the difficulties in supporting a full Swedish team in his statement on why the team was no longer playing under his banner:

Having been with us for the past month and a half, it is difficult to say goodbye to such a talented group of players. We part ways on good terms, and wish the best to each and every one of those players. We still believe they are capable of being one of the best teams in the world, and hope that they find themselves with an organization that can help solicit that. Being an entirely Swedish roster, it was very difficult for our predominantly North American infrastructure to help them out, and obviously the language barrier made it incredibly difficult to give them the support they needed. This parting was more out of respect than anything else, as we believe with the right organization and the right infrastructure, they have what it takes to be truly great. Sometimes it's about recognizing where you are out of your element, and supporting an entirely Swedish speaking team was a little too far out of reach for us right now. We will be keeping a close eye on this roster, and maybe will work with some of them again in the future. Best of luck to NG Blue (Now Bringos) and we wish them the best moving forward!

Previously known as Gringos, the team looked to be on the verge of a breakthrough when they were picked up at the end of May but have remained at a similar level, occasionally making runs in tournament but on the whole struggling to enter Europe’s top ten. This put them in contrast to their North American counterparts, who have slowly improved to challenge the top five teams in their continent.

It is unclear whether Northern Gaming are looking to pick up another European team or whether they will scale back to focus on Northern Gaming Red. For Bringos, if they agree with Mack in that they can become a top tier team with the correct infrastructure, it becomes a battle to find an organisation that can help the Swedish team develop. NiP have reportedly been searching for a team, which could be a good match from that perspective. For the team and potential organisations, a lot rides on how promising they can make their roster appear in this downtime.

The members of Bringos declined to comment on their recent situation.

The following roster will now be playing as Bringos:

  • Jessie “eure” Eurenius (support)
  • Ray “Shadez” Chan (dps)
  • Jonathan “liddano” Lidgren (dps)
  • Henrik “NuttyBigB” Romby (support)
  • Samuel “Zaphe” Lohi (flex)
  • Emil “Mint” Krüger (tank)