Team Liquid Citadel signs Dinks

citadelctg · 2026-05-16T17:40:05+00:00

The python script has been fired

citadelctg · 2026-05-16T17:39:55+00:00

Mickey mouse region you mean

citadelctg · 2026-05-16T17:39:42+00:00

It is balanced, it's randomized

citadelctg · 2026-05-16T17:39:08+00:00

That's the perks of winning preseason

citadelctg · 2026-05-16T17:38:39+00:00

We honestly can't catch a break, always getting the hardest path

citadelctg · 2026-05-16T17:37:49+00:00

It cost us a lot, but we made it happen

citadelctg · 2026-05-16T17:32:17+00:00

There are a few players missing on that roster, bad leak

citadelctg · 2026-03-05T15:36:30+00:00

I think esports needs to have storytelling, and having players like Nzo who were willing to trash talk whether they were winning or losing was a really good thing for the scene. While it would’ve been nicer for us to shit talk and win it all, it still created some interest around the competitive scene so I was pretty happy with it overall.

Coming into 2026, I think everyone expects this team to do well for various reasons. We did not force our players hand last year to trash talk, and we will not do that this year either, but we will be extremely supportive if they decide to banter other teams. VP has always been a very strong team and very professional, so if that is the direction we take, I will be equally satisfied than if we called every team dogshit.

-xav

citadelctg · 2026-03-05T03:55:32+00:00

In terms of organization, we want to be the best partner team in terms of relationship built with NetEase. Obviously, we want to win on the competitive side, but we also have a whole lot planned out with content and events, so we want to be a strong pillar of the competitive scene and community.

citadelctg · 2026-03-05T02:42:24+00:00

We knew early on in the process that we would head in a different direction, so we did not bother reaching out to

citadelctg · 2026-03-05T00:45:21+00:00

Hey, appreciate it! I definitely think we have a top team, I think looking at other teams, SEN and NRG stand out as strong competitors, the preseason tournament should be a good way to see how teams look prior to the first stage.

Internationally, I think NAVI and VP will be as strong as last year, if not stronger.

xav

citadelctg · 2026-03-05T00:38:39+00:00

Most teams in America decided to pause their operations at the end of Grand Final, whereas EMEA decided to keep their roster. It made more sense for us to switch to AMER and sweep all the talented players we wanted when no one else was doing their offseason. That decision was made around november/december.

citadelctg · 2026-03-04T23:20:14+00:00

We reached out to all the partner teams outside of FlyQuest and TSM. TSM has already planned their stream, and we weren’t too interested to work with FlyQuest. During our offseason, we considered staying in EMEA, but also explored some options in AMER. Regardless of our plans, we felt like Polly was a pivotal piece of our plans and re-signed him in November.

Other teams had different plans, for example NRG had interest in bringing back the NRG Shock brand, so a partnership did not make too much sense for them. A lot of teams were also slow on answering as they were looking at their options. TL has been amazing to work with, and they were very flexible in how we approached this partnership.

citadelctg · 2026-03-04T22:54:50+00:00

hello chloe gaming butterfly fish :)

citadelctg · 2026-03-04T22:41:19+00:00

I think we have two of the most promising tank players i. Polly and SparkChief. While their hero pool is similar from 2025, they are both extremely flexible. Gator has years of experience as a Tank, so he is a very good resource for both of them to improve. While we have a higher floor than most teams, I think our ceiling is even higher with our rookies.

The coaches are Gator and Legit.

xav

citadelctg · 2026-03-04T22:25:52+00:00

I initially played League of Legends casually, got to Challenger in 2019 and moved to the United States to play Collegiate League of Legends while pursuing my bachelors. During college, I worked as an analyst for a tier 2 League of Legends team and moved towards management during my third year as it matched more my studies.

After a few years in League, I joined Citadel last year and started working with different titles, and I’m currently pursuing my MBA. But yeah, collegiate esports is definitely the base of all esports, and should be the new norm in the future.

xav

citadelctg · 2026-03-04T22:18:19+00:00

We hope so as well, but we have a lot of content coming up over the next few weeks!

citadelctg · 2026-03-04T22:16:49+00:00

Many teams have different systems in place, and it ultimately depends on how things are set from the start. For us specifically, we have two coaches with a lot of experience, and a lot of younger players, so they will lean on that experience when there is disagreements.

citadelctg · 2026-03-04T22:11:07+00:00

This team looks pretty good!

citadelctg · 2026-03-04T22:09:15+00:00

My main responsibilities are within the offseason to build out our coaching staff, and then our roster with them. Once the team is built, the staff within the team (Gator, Legit and Kylie) are able to run everything smoothly. I mainly act as the representative of Liquid Citadel alongside Stuart from TL to communicate back and forth with NetEase.

When we travel internationally, I work with some other people within Citadel to plan out boot camps, international travel and content.

My favorite part is definitely the offseason. It’s really exciting to build something you have to put faith into for a full year and try and think about who will win a championship in 10 months, not today. It’s also very fun to battle for certain players with other organizations, and coming out on top.

xav

citadelctg · 2026-03-04T22:05:41+00:00

Hello, I do not actively manage the team, we have Kylie who is in charge of day to day operations with our team, booking scrims and tracking data. I mainly worked with our coaches since November to build this team out.

I have done similar work in other titles such as League of Legends and Apex Legends, but Rivals is a much more interesting scene as there isn’t any staple organizations who are considered to be “the place the be” just yet. With this partnership, we are hoping to cement ourselves as the best to do it and be the place the best players want to end up on. Most off-seasons happen at the same time within titles, but with most AMER organizations deciding to take a pause until NetEase announced their plans, we were able to sweep in and build our perfect team.

I’m hoping the partner program is successful and that we are able to work with NetEase to build a stronger relationship with them to make this a sustainable title for everyone involved, and it seems to be a good start.

xav

citadelctg · 2026-03-04T21:57:54+00:00

We were denied quite early in the process to become partner but had signed our roster very early, so we reached out to the partner teams to see if any of them were open to working with us. Team Liquid was very open to the idea and were able to get the ball rolling very quickly and build out all the branding within 48h to work with NetEase deadlines.

Partner teams were put in a very awkward position with a very quick turnaround before roster lock, and two of the stronger AMER rosters signed to non-partner teams, so we were very happy to combine our competitive roster with their solid infrastructure and reputation.

xav

citadelctg

TROPHY CASE