ENCE bring allu back as head coach of its Counter-Strike team

ENCE filled its empty coaching seat on Tuesday, June 9, 2026. In a statement published on its own site that day, the Finnish organization said Aleksi "allu" Jalli returns as head coach of its Counter-Strike 2 team. The post came four days after ENCE announced that it was parting ways with George "Whitey" White, the coach who had led its academy since the program began.

The appointment does not settle who plays. ENCE wrote that the current roster remains under evaluation, and that the new coach now takes part in that work: the club will assess the team with him, define its direction and then decide. The five players he inherits were the organization's academy squad until April 1, when ENCE made them its main roster for a transition period.

ENCE statements of April 1, June 5 and June 9, 2026; HLTV, June 9, 2026. The four days run from June 5 to June 9.

What ENCE announced

The title is head coach of the CS2 team, with no interim label. In Counter-Strike, the head coach prepares the game plan, runs practice and stands behind the five players during matches. ENCE's statement presents allu as one of the most iconic players in its history and describes the move as a natural transition from player to coach.

Two people speak in the announcement. Eemeli "Woomera" Ikonen, whom the post names as ENCE's general manager, opens it. "Making a change in the coaching staff is always a significant moment for a team," he said. He added that the culture, the professionalism and the mindset the club wants are already in place in the group.

The new coach is plain about his starting point. He said he would not pretend to have every answer as a coach, and that what he brings is years spent at the top level of the game. He also said that some of his best memories in Counter-Strike were made at ENCE, and that returning feels right.

The post gives no contract length, names no assistant and lists no tournament as his first. It also gives no deadline for the evaluation of the roster.

Four days without a coach

The seat had been open since Friday, June 5. That day ENCE published a farewell to Whitey under the headline "Thank you, Whitey" and wrote that it was parting ways with him after four years. The same post told readers that the next coach would be named in the coming days.

Whitey's time at the club is the story of its academy. An academy is a second team in which an organization trains young players before they are ready for its main roster. ENCE unveiled its program in spring 2022, and Whitey was part of it from the start, the club wrote. He coached its rosters through online leagues and LAN events, the tournaments where teams play in the same room.

In the farewell, Woomera credited him directly for the step the club took in April. Promoting the academy to the main roster would not have been possible without Whitey's work, he said. He also gave the reason for the change in one idea: a main roster plays for higher stakes, and ENCE wants a fresh start at this point. Whitey wrote that he was saying goodbye with sadness and that he hoped the organization would return to the top.

How the academy became the main team

The coaching change is the latest step of a rebuild that began in March. ENCE had fielded international line-ups for several seasons. On March 11, it moved its five players and its coaching staff to the bench, which means they stay under contract but no longer play for the team, and made them available for transfer. HLTV reported the decision that day and quoted ENCE's statement, which said the next team would have Finnish talent at its core. The head coach benched with the players was Niclas "enkay J" Krumhorn, in the job since September 2024.

Three weeks later the club chose its own youngsters to hold the place. On April 1, ENCE announced that its academy team would go on hiatus and that its roster would compete as the main roster for the time being. It called the group a transition-period roster, to play while the club evaluates and plans further changes, and said it was also scouting and trialing players from outside. Whitey moved up with the players as their coach.

One change came with the promotion. Henri "HENU" Ylilehto, a former academy player, returned to the roster in place of Matti "Matz" Alatalo, who became a free agent. The club's younger development team, ENCE Prospects, was not affected and kept playing in NUKE-Liiga, a Finnish youth league.

ENCE also said how it meant to proceed. It wanted to take its time with the build and avoid rushed decisions, it wrote on April 1. Ten weeks later, the sentence about a roster still under evaluation says the same thing with a new person in the room.

The five players he takes over

HLTV lists the active line-up on June 9 as Aleksi "millert" Lehtopuu, Teemu "teme" Korva, Niki "Cliqq" Kinnunen, HENU and Giorgi "Schwarz" Gakhokidze. Four are Finnish. Schwarz is Georgian and is the team's in-game leader, the player who calls the tactics during a round, according to ENCE's April post. The club wrote then that its academy had taken in a few international players while keeping its focus on Finnish talent.

It is a young group. HENU, at 23, is the oldest of the five in HLTV's listing, and the academy as a whole counted 12 players over its four years, ENCE wrote in April. Two of them had reached the main team before this spring: Paavo "podi" Heiskanen in 2024 and Ville "myltsi" Vilkman in 2025.

The ranking shows how far the rebuild has moved the club from where it stood. HLTV placed ENCE 67th in its world ranking of March 9, two days before the benching. The site's list of April 13 had it 130th, the one of April 20 had it 125th, and its report on the appointment gives 143rd. The academy squad, counted as a separate team until its promotion, was 114th on March 30.

Where the benched roster stands

The players benched in March have not all left, and the coach benched with them has. HLTV's report of June 9 still shows three of the five on ENCE's bench and a fourth on loan, an arrangement in which a player joins another team for a set period while his contract stays with his club.

Viktor "sdy" Orudzhev spent more than two years at ENCE before Passion UA announced his loan on April 27, to run until the end of the season, HLTV reported. Ryan "Neityu" Aubry has played elsewhere without leaving: HLTV reported on April 23 that he would stand in for FaZe, as a temporary replacement. ENCE said in March that the benched players were available for transfer.

A former player on the bench

ENCE's choice keeps the project inside the club's own history. HLTV counts more than five years for allu as an ENCE player, across three spells between 2013 and 2022. He was an AWPer, the player who uses the AWP, the game's main sniper rifle. Between spells he played abroad for FaZe and OpTic.

His third stay was the most successful. It brought two notable trophies and an appearance in the grand final of a Major, the championship tournaments of Counter-Strike, HLTV wrote. Dot Esports, in its report on the benching in March, placed that final at Katowice in 2019, where ENCE lost to Astralis.

The new coach was a player until two months ago. He is 34, and his last competitive match came in April, HLTV reported: the grand final of Elisa Open Finland Season 12, in which his team, CSDIILIT, lost to ENCE. The club that beat him that day is the club he now coaches.

What the evaluation leaves open

ENCE has set no date for its decisions. Its June 9 statement names three steps, in order: assess the team, define the direction, make decisions. The April post had already said that outside players were being scouted and trialed, so the review covers both the five in place and candidates beyond them.

For the players, the question is the one ENCE raised when it promoted them. The club wrote on April 1 that the transition period gave them more resources and a chance to earn a permanent place.

For Finnish Counter-Strike, the appointment adds a second piece to the plan announced in March. The club then said its team would be rebuilt around Finnish talent. It now has a Finnish head coach, four Finnish players out of five, and a youth team still feeding the system below them.

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