NAVI Rhilech on training jungle Ezreal: "Pros are too afraid to try new things, even in scrims"

With a third win on the board, the ascent of continues in the 2026 LEC Spring Split. After stumbling against in Week 2, the team bounced back with a convincing victory over . Still, now is no time for the Ukrainian organization to slow down, especially as the playoff race heats up and their Week 5 road trip to Évry-Courcouronnes approaches.

In an exclusive interview, the team’s jungler, , sat down with Sheep Esports ahead of his match against to discuss NAVI’s rise and recent results. He also shared insight into what it truly means to be a pro player, and how his career has shaped his development both as an athlete and as a person.

Enes "Rhilech" Uçan: “Today’s win feels really good, especially when compared to last week’s 0–2 against Vitality. I feel that we are improving. Even though Vitality was a better team than Heretics, we still played so much better than last week. And we will be even better next week. I'm really convinced of this.

Rhilech: Yeah, it’s clear that we’re not a top three team for now—we’re not there yet. Still, even if it’s slowly and one step at a time, I do feel we are improving well. We will get there.

Rhilech: For sure. At the start, we were trying to improve on too many things at once. Sometimes we are still falling back into these habits, but overall we’ve had clearer plans and goals: we are aware of what we did well, what we did badly, what we need to do better. When you have this lucidity, it’s easier to work on your improvement. You just need to put in some discipline, as much effort as you can, and you will eventually improve.

Rhilech: When thinking of pro play, people see it as having fun and making a job out of playing games. You get to go to new countries, cities, spend time with your gamer friends—it feels cool. But in the end, you have the obligation to play this game every day and make it your life. You need to be at your 100% every single day and put in everything you’ve got. That's the hardest part about this—doing the same thing over and over, the same routine, keeping the same discipline every day. It’s not as easy as it looks.

This is also a thing outside of esports, it applies to almost any job in the world. You need to wake up and shape every day around it. After some time, the game can become boring, and you need to find ways to keep enjoying this routine. I love what I do, to wake up and play the game every day, spam solo queue. That’s how I’m improving. If I didn’t enjoy League, I wouldn’t be improving like that.

Rhilech: Hard question. I think players who’ve played for 4–5 years in the LEC might be like this. I can’t know what goes on inside their heads, but you can see how some older players don’t care about solo queue anymore, right? They only focus on scrims, and I can imagine that solo queue may not seem as fun as it once was for some of them. Still, overall, I don’t think there are players who straight up don’t enjoy League of Legends at all anymore. Most players enjoy the game in their own ways.

Rhilech: It’s pressure, but it’s positive pressure that makes my play better. Everyone—from fans to insiders—expect me to carry and play as well as I’ve already shown I can.

The mindset I have is simply that I can always do more, I can always do even better. I’ve shown what I can do, and I can do it again. Every day, I want to push myself further, never dropping my standards for myself. I’m always pushing to be the best player I can be.

Rhilech: I think so. When you put center your life around this discipline and your routine, your mindset will inevitably change. I think of everything in how it will impact my career. If I do something, will it make my performance better in our next official? If I eat that, will I be in a better shape to perform?

Being a professional has led me to think about my body and condition a lot more. It’s a really important thing to keep in mind. If you can minimize factors that will influence you negatively, it will have an impact on how you play.

Rhilech: Well, when you want to win, you will do anything to reach your goals. When you lose, you will get tilted, you will get frustrated. If you’re not careful, you can get toxic with your teammates.

That’s the worst thing that can happen in a team environment. After it happens once, it’s really hard to recover as a group. I would never want to be someone’s that’s toxic to others. I don’t want to be that guy that goes like: “Okay, why are you doing this? Why are you making these easy mistakes? Don’t do this, you are so bad.” When you start to think or say things like this, it will affect the team’s environment so much.

I might have done it in the past, I’ve been in esports for about five years, but I’ve always tried to avoid that. If it gets to that point, you will instantly realize when it’s affecting both your teammates, and yourself.

Rhilech: Mostly I’m trying to be honest, but sometimes, players don’t want to give inside info. No one will say that their team environment is bad, or that support and mid can’t get along with each other.

Rhilech: Yeah, I agree with this. I think Koreans and Chinese players have very clear and established styles. They’re all playing similarly within their respective regions, and Western players who watch their VODs just try to copy them. So if the creativity isn’t coming from LCK or LPL, there won’t be much from others.

Last year, I knew that Dr. Mundo was overpowered. I was spamming it in solo queue and playing it in scrims, but no one in the world was playing it. Then played a few games at Worlds, and after that everyone started copying it.

There are still a lot of OP champs, a lot of good picks. Like Zed last year— played a few games and everyone realized it, even though it was already strong before.

You need to be creative, but it’s something that varies for each player. I believe it’s one of my strongest assets. I can see what picks are good, which ones are bait, what could work, and what can’t. Pros are too afraid to try new things, even in scrims, and especially in officials.”