According to a report from Dot Esports, former Astralis mid laner Erlend “Nukeduck” Våtevik and former Misfits support Petr “denyk” Haramach will start for Excel Esports going into the League of Legends European Championship 2021 Summer Split. Previous starting support Tore “Tore” Hoel Eilertsen will be joining MAD Lions’ Academy lineup.
Excel replace Czekolad and Tore with Nukeduck and denyk
With this move, rookie mid laner Paweł “Czekolad” Szczepanik will no longer start for Excel after a one-split stint with the team. Czekolad was brought onto Excel in December 2020 after an impressive European Masters win with AGO Rogue. His replacement, Nukeduck, stepped down from Astralis’ main roster in February in order to attend to personal issues. In April, Nukeduck announced that he was once again looking for offers.
— Erlend Nukeduck Holm (@Nukeduck) April 19, 2021
Denyk will be making a comeback after being benched and replaced by Polish veteran Oskar “Vander” Bogdan on Misfits’ LEC lineup ahead of the 2021 season. Denyk first joined Misfits’ main team in the middle of Summer 2020 to replace Mads “Doss” Schwarts.
According to the report from Dot, this isn’t the first time the organization has tried to make changes to the starting lineup since the beginning of the 2021 season. Excel attempted changes in the middle of the Spring Split. They sent Czekolad and Tore home with plans to substitute in players from the organization’s academy team. This never came to fruition due to a rule in the LEC rulebook stating that players with 13 or more LEC matches cannot participate in any European Regional League regular season games, playoffs or EU Masters event for the current Split. In the 2021 Spring Split, Excel placed eighth with a 7-11 record. Since joining the LEC in 2019, Excel Esports has yet to earn a single playoffs qualification following the regular season.
Excel declined to comment on the move.
