The Los Ratones project might be over, but their impact as a player/creator-led entity, rather than a traditional esports organisation structure, has arguably changed tier 2 esports forever.
Last year, Los Ratones dragged the Northern League of Legends Championship (NLC) viewership to unprecedented new heights.
The EMEA Regional League (ERL) for the UK, Ireland, and Nordics was one of the least-watched ERLs in 2024, with just over 2,000 peak viewers in its Spring split, according to Esports Charts.
In Spring 2025, peak viewership grew over 100 times higher, with more than 223,000 people watching.
Of course, everyone wanted to see how the all-star team put together by League of Legends streamer and personality Caedrel would fare. The roster – consisting of Rekkles, Crownie, Nemesis, Velja, and Thebausffs – also streamed their scrims, pulling in millions of combined views throughout the year.
Other teams also pulled in big-name players and creators (Noway4u and Santorin at Nord, Perkz and Jankos at Ruddy, to name a few). This, along with the NLC’s string of excellent broadcast talent, including Archarom, Foxdrop, Troubleinc, Initialise, Hiprain, Jamada, Eragon, Middlecott, Duckling, and Solari, created what was a near-perfect year for the ERL.
NLC enjoys its best-ever year in 2025
Not only did The NLC go from being one of the least-watched ERLs to the most-watched in Europe, but more people were tuning in to watch Los Ratones than they were the North American LTA.
The UK and Nordics enjoyed some of their best-ever events throughout 2025, in Nottingham, Copenhagen, and Stockholm, with thousands of esports fans gathering to watch Los Ratones compete with teams including Nord Esports, Bulldog Esports, Verdant, The Ruddy Sack, Rich Gang Esports, and more.
Los Ratones also became the first NLC team to win an EMEA Masters title, beating other orgs from across EMEA to establish themselves as the best tier 2 team below the LEC. They then picked up a second EMEA Masters title just for fun.
Los Ratones had become the golden child of NLC organisers Leagues Media, and League of Legends publisher Riot Games soon found a way to embed Caedrel and co into the higher-tier LEC.
The LEC Versus tournament was created, with the usual 10 LEC partner teams plus an additional two: firstly, the EMEA Masters Summer winners (Karmine Corp Blue) and, secondly, a team invited for “consistent, standout performance across the 2025 EMEA Masters season” (Los Ratones).
However, after these enormous highs came devastating new lows.
NLC situation worsens as Los Ratones leave
Last month, after finishing ninth at LEC Versus, Caedrel announced the end of the Los Ratones project.
This was more than just bad news for the NLC, which was already going through its own set of problems.
Leagues Media had let some staff go last year as part of its decision to centralise business operations in Copenhagen, and now NLC broadcast talent were posting about late payments, being dropped and other issues they had experienced.
The NLC broadcast was left without anyone to cast over the matches, making a tier 2 ERL that was very recently the most-watched seem like a series of random high-elo ranked matches in the game client, with the only difference being the addition of player cams.
Witchcraft claims EMEA Masters spot
On March 4th, 2026, it was announced that most of the Los Ratones roster had gotten back together under a new name: Witchcraft.
This team saw Bwipo replace Baus in the top lane, with YamatoCannon and Shaves – who had been a part of Los Ratones for the past few months – on the coaching staff.
Witchcraft announced they would be competing in the Winter 2026 EMEA Masters, which, for the first time, will see its top two teams qualify for the new Esports World Cup Qualifier.
However, this was at the detriment of one of four NLC teams, who were up until this point under the impression they would still have four qualification slots from the NLC to the EMEA Masters.
UK esports organisations Verdant and Bulldog Esports found out at the last minute that they would compete against one another for the third spot, with Witchcraft taking the fourth.
Because of the last-minute nature of Witchcraft forming and taking Los Ratones’ EMEA Masters spot, this meant they replaced fourth seed Bulldog – a decision that understandably upset them.
Bulldog co-owner Alex Jolly said on X: “Nice as an NLC owner to find out the day of the announcement, one of the four NLC EMEA slots will be going to 4 LR lads and a misogynist [referring to Bwipo’s past comments about women competing in esports while on their period].
“All those morals about Leagues gg and not playing go out the window when they offer you a way to play in the Saudi Blood Money Cup.”
It seems there is one rule for traditional esports organizations, and another for those who have the viewership power to convince organisers for special invitations and opportunities.
There is no org as such here, it’s a group of players, of course. YamatoCannon, on the Witchcraft announcement video, said they are CEO-less, but that mid-laner Nemesis is ‘technically the CEO’.
When asked how long the Witchcraft project will be, he said: “Til we’re out of the competition. So, it’s a very short-term thing with no promises of anything else. We’re just going to do the competition and then that’s it.
“Who’s funding? Well, there’s no funding to be needed (laughs). We don’t need any funding. We’re playing from home and everyone’s doing it for free.”
How can organisations compete with that?
For me, this all underlines how creator and player-led teams are the future of tier 2 esports, bypassing management and traditional organisation structures with sheer pulling power. Is it fair? No. Is it exciting? Absolutely – the viewers win. But at a time when esports is in the state that it’s in, nothing surprises me anymore. It certainly makes things even more challenging for traditional tier 2 orgs.