The academy project continues to take shape in a promising direction for G2 Esports. After the team recently secured toplaner Francesco "Shelfmade" Cardia and jungler Mark "Markoon" van Woensel, as previously reported by Sheep Esports, two new players have been added to the project to form the team’s new botlane.

AD carry Khalil "Rin" Sahraoui and support Timo "Tockimo" Bock will join G2 Nord, sources tell Sheep Esports on Wednesday. The former arrives after an excellent year with Los Heretics, while the latter is a Prime League regular who spent the past season competing for E WIE EINFACH E-SPORTS.

Despite exploring options in LEC, and being considered by LFL teams such as Vitality.Bee, Rin still had to find a home in ERL, but will perfectly land in G2 Esports' newly formed academy team.

Between competitiveness and development?

With these new signings, G2 Esports’ academy roster—coached by Nicolas Perez—continues to build a solid foundation. The team aims to remain competitive in the upcoming year while nurturing the potential of players who, aside from Markoon, have never played in the LEC and remain relatively young.

Tockimo is a German support who has spent his entire career in the Prime League or its second division. This year, he finished second in the Winter Split with his team and qualified for the EMEA Masters, where they unfortunately faced Karmine Corp Blue and Los Ratones. The rest of the year brought limited success, yet his individual performances still drew the attention of G2 for its academy project.

Meanwhile, Algerian AD carry Rin arrives following a far more successful season with Los Heretics. Although the team claimed only one trophy—the Superliga Winter Split—they finished as finalists in both the Summer Split and the EMEA Masters Summer, maintaining a consistently high level of performance throughout the year. Rin distinguished himself in the AD carry role, particularly on champions like Varus, his most-played pick (19 games) with which he achieved a 79% win rate. He will discover the Prime League next year and will be part of G2’s first ERL roster since the dissolution of G2 Arctic in 2022.