After a rather positive year,
Top Esports are making two changes to their roster for 2025. In the jungle, to compensate for
Gao "Tian" Tian-Liang's departure to Weibo Gaming and for the Support role to replace
Tian "Meiko" Ye, who has left for Invictus Gaming. The rest of the roster remains the same, with Lin "
Creme" Jian and Yu "
JackeyLove" Wen-Bo still under contract until November 2025 and toplaner Bai "
369" Jia-Hao having renewed his contract earlier this offseason.
A new Jungle/Support duo
While replacing the Tian/Meiko pairing may seem rather complicated on paper, TES have relied on two experienced players who have already reached the top to do so. Let's talk about the jungle first, with the arrival of Seo “
Kanavi” Jin-hyeok. After more than five years with
JD Gaming, the organization's emblematic jungler is taking off for new horizons. It's a huge coup for TES, which recruits one of LPL's most decorated junglers with 4x LPL titles, 1x MSI and 1x Asian Games.
However, after coming close to the Golden Road in 2023, JDG and Kanavi had a harder time of it in 2024. Indeed, the team finished 3rd in the Spring Split, 7-8 in the Summer and missed out on qualification for the year's two international tournaments. At TES, Kanavi will be hoping to return to success and do better than this year, which is one of the worst of his career in terms of results.
To complete the roster, Liu "
Crisp" Qing-Songwill accompany JackeyLove on the botlane. The 2019 World Champion leaves
Weibo Gaming after two years and some rather positive results, including a Worlds final, lost to T1 in 2023. However, since his Worlds success with
FunPlus Phoenix, Crisp hasn't found his way back to the top except at the Weibo Cup 2022. The year 2024 is a good example of this, as he finished 5th-6th in the Spring and 2nd in the Summer, losing in the playoff final to
Bilibili Gaming. Weibo managed to qualify for Worlds 2024, but was eliminated in the quarter-finals, again against BLG.
Kanavi doesn't come alone
In addition to Kanavi, TES have also recruited Yoon "Homme" Sung-young from JDG. He will officiate as Head Coach next year with a jungler he knows well, having spent almost the same number of years at JDG together.
With these changes, Top Esports hope to do at least as well as last year in the LPL (2nd in Spring and 3rd in Summer), while improving their international performances, as they finished 5th-6th at MSI and 5th-8th at Worlds. On paper, the team looks set to rub shoulders with other Chinese superteams such as Invictus Gaming, JDG, BLG and WBG.
TES 2025 roster:
Top: Bai "369" Jia-Hao
Jungle: Seo "Kanavi" Jin-hyeok
Mid: Lin "Creme" Jian
ADC: Yu "JackeyLove" Wen-Bo
Support: Liu "Crisp" Qing-Song
For more roster changes, check out our Transfers Hub Header Photo Credit: Top Esports/Renaud Futterer
