NA team Evil Geniuses is dealing with some issues as the LCS season begins. On their official Twitter account, they announced they are undergoing visa problems. As a result, they will make some temporary changes to their LCS Academy roster.
Due to unforeseen visa delays, we will be starting the #LCS Academy season with the following substitutions:
🔹@KumoLoL will be playing mid lane in place of @Giyuu_lol
🔹@Svenskeren1 will be playing jungle in place of @KadirlolWe will share any developments ASAP. #LIVEEVIL
— Evil Geniuses (@EvilGeniuses) January 24, 2020
The Evil Geniuses Academy team was looking forward to playing with its official mid-laner and jungler, but because of visa problems, they have had to substitute them out with two other players. First, Dennis “Svenskeren” Johnsen will replace jungler Kadircan “Kadir” MumcuoÄŸlu. We will also see Colin “Kumo” Zhao replace Ahmad “Giyuu” Charif in mid lane.
As this is a recent issue, it seems the team has not figured out all of the details of this substitution, nor do they know how long these subs will stay.
Extremely excited for the future can't wait to show what i'm made of https://t.co/raV0n5gNot
— Kadircan (@Kadirlol) January 3, 2020
Traveling is a pain
These visa issues are not much of a surprise, though. Kadir is from the Netherlands, and Giyuu is from Lebanon. Evil Geniuses is unfortunately not the first team to meet with this conflict, as it’s been increasingly common in the last few months. Team Liquid dealt with visa delays for three of their players earlier this month. TSM also ran into some issues, finding themselves unable to bring their entire team to China.
Solutions are needed
These travel problems have been a headache for plenty of NA teams, and team owners are forced to find quick solutions. Unfortunately, these issues can impact both games and the future of some players. Recently, Germany has introduced an esports visa for the LEC. Doing so should help alleviate some of these conflicts, and it would benefit NA to do the same.
Currently, Svenskeren serves as Evil Geniuses’ jungler for their main LCS team, and Kumo is their top laner. As the LCS and Academy seasons start on different days, we will see these players on both Friday and Saturday. Hopefully, the extra Academy matches won’t hurt their performance overall.
