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The people who put the Northern League of Legends Championship on screen have gone public about their pay. Casters, hosts, a stage manager and a former director of the league said this week that they were paid late, or are still waiting to be paid, according to a report Sheep Esports published on Thursday, February 19, 2026.
The NLC answered with a statement of regret on Wednesday, February 18. A day later it paused the competition and postponed Week 7 of its Winter Split, saying it had opened talks with Riot Games, the publisher of League of Legends, and other parties. The league is run by Leagues, a company based in Denmark that operates the competition for Riot.
Sheep Esports, February 19, 2026, relaying public statements by the people concerned and the NLC's statements of February 18 and 19.
Who says what
The complaints started on X on Monday, February 16, Sheep Esports reports, and came from people across the broadcast and the organization. None of them gave a total for what they say is owed. What they described instead is how long they waited, and how the operator answered.
Adam "Eragon" Harney, a caster and host on the league since 2023, wrote publicly that the NLC does not pay its talent. He said he first waited nearly five months for a salary, which was eventually paid, and that the operator refused to pay the late fees he asked for. He shared screenshots of his exchanges, including messages from the accounting side that he said came only after many emails.
Alexandre "Archarom" Maia, a host of the league since 2022, said Eragon's case is not the only one. He said he had a contract with the league, is still waiting for the full payment due under it, and is being ignored. Antonis "Rev" Stepchenko put his own situation in four words: "Still haven't been paid."
Related readWhen a team stops paying its players: what a league can doTwo members of the staff side spoke too. Sam Sugarman, the stage manager of NLC Stockholm, the league's live event in August 2025, said he had received no message at all about when his pay would arrive. Frazer, a former director of the NLC, said the operator offered a payment plan spread over a full year, with 30% of the amount owed written off, and presented the alternative as bankruptcy and no payment at all.
The table sets out the accounts as Sheep Esports reported them, each in the words of the person concerned.
| Person | Role | Account |
|---|---|---|
| Eragon | Caster and host since 2023 | Waited nearly five months for a salary, since paid; late fees refused. |
| Archarom | Host since 2022 | Still waiting for full payment under his contract. |
| Rev | League contributor | Says he has not been paid. |
| Sam Sugarman | Stage manager, NLC Stockholm | No message received about when his pay would arrive. |
| Frazer | Former NLC director | Offered a one-year plan with 30% of the debt written off. |
Statements by each person, relayed by Sheep Esports. No amounts were published.
The problem was not new to the league's followers. Sheep Esports notes that Esports News UK had reported recurring payment delays at the NLC in January, and that the league said at the time it intended to issue a statement. That statement came more than a month later.
What the NLC said
The league's answer came on Wednesday, February 18, as a long statement posted across its social media accounts. Its first line on money was an apology: "We sincerely regret the delays in payments that occurred during this period."
The statement then set out what the operator says it did. It said it had declined certain late fees. It said it had offered to cover any documented costs caused directly by the delayed payments, and that it had received no response to that offer. And it said that, with the support and goodwill of several larger creditors, it had secured the funding it needed and settled all original invoices.
Related readWhy the Call of Duty League cannot cap or tax what teams pay playersTwo of the people named above dispute parts of this. Sugarman said he never received the offer to cover the costs of the delay. Frazer, answering the claim that all original invoices had been settled, said they too had been paid late and had been offered the one-year payment plan with a 30% write-off.
The statement also covered the changes to the broadcast that preceded the complaints. The league said it had moved toward a new approach to its broadcast, that the communication around those changes could have been handled better, and that it should have done better. It said the figures of the Winter Split supported its creator-driven direction. Of Georgia "Troubleinc" Paras and Jake "Hiprain" Matthews, two members of the broadcast who are no longer with the league, it said they were experienced professionals appreciated for their work on screen.
Both have spoken about how they left. Troubleinc, active on the league since 2020, said she is no longer part of the NLC and called the league's communication about the changes misguided. Hiprain said he was let go through a direct message on Discord. Neither tied an unpaid amount to their departure.
A paused week and talks with Riot
The second statement came on Thursday, February 19. The NLC paused the competition and postponed Week 7 of the Winter Split. Leagues said it had initiated dialogue with Riot Games and other relevant parties, and that those talks could continue into the following week.
The NLC later confirmed on X that the week's matches would go ahead. Its confirmation said nothing about the official broadcast, Sheep Esports noted.
Related read3DMAX players and coaches go public over late and unpaid salariesThe steps below set out the week as the statements and the report give it.
- January 2026Esports News UK reports recurring payment delays; the league says a statement will follow.
- Monday, February 16Casters, hosts and former staff go public on X.
- Wednesday, February 18The NLC regrets the delays and says all original invoices are settled.
- Thursday, February 19The competition is paused, Week 7 postponed, talks opened with Riot.
- After the pauseThe NLC confirms that the matches will be played.
The timing matters for the teams. Riot's preliminary calendar for 2026, published in November 2025 with the warning that dates could vary from one league to another, set the regional Winter Splits from January 7 to March 8, with EMEA Masters Winter, the event where the best teams of the regional leagues meet, pencilled in from March 9 to 15.
How late payment works in the European Union
Sheep Esports placed the dispute in its legal setting. Leagues is based in Denmark, and the outlet reports that it missed the 30-day payment deadline several times. Under Danish rules, Sheep Esports writes, the person who issued an invoice can claim extra fees for late payment, which the outlet says the operator must pay.
The outlet also cited the European Union's rule on late payment, Directive 2011/7/EU, adopted on February 16, 2011, which member states had to bring into national law by March 16, 2013. It applies to payments made for commercial transactions, which the directive defines as dealings between undertakings, or between undertakings and public authorities, for goods or services supplied for payment. An undertaking, in the directive's words, is any organization other than a public authority acting in the course of its independent economic or professional activity.
Interest on a late invoice cannot simply be written out of a contract
Under the directive, a term or a practice that excludes interest for late payment is considered grossly unfair, and one that excludes compensation for recovery costs is presumed to be. Whether a given person can claim depends on their contract and on national law.
The directive sets the default figures. Between businesses, when a contract fixes no date, interest starts to run 30 calendar days after the debtor receives the invoice. A contract may set a longer period, but not beyond 60 calendar days unless the contract expressly says so and the term is not grossly unfair to the creditor. The interest is statutory: a rate equal to a reference rate plus at least eight percentage points. On top of it, the creditor is entitled to a fixed sum of 40 euros for the costs of recovering the debt, and to reasonable compensation for recovery costs above that sum.
Related read6GPA Expelled From Prime League 2 Over Unpaid WagesThat is the frame in which the operator's statement that it declined certain late fees reads. Eragon says the fees he asked for were refused. The NLC says it declined some, and offered to cover documented costs instead. No ruling on any of the claims has been published.
The league and its operator
The NLC is the regional league of League of Legends for the Nordic countries, the United Kingdom and Ireland, in Riot's own description. It is one of the 13 EMEA Regional Leagues, or ERLs, that Riot listed for 2026: the second tier of competition in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, below the LEC, the region's top professional league. Riot's November 2025 post says fostering young prospects into stars of the competitive scene will always be the primary goal of that tier.
The league is the top of a pyramid. Riot's guide to the 2025 season describes the NLC as made of a first division for the region's best teams, with five national leagues underneath: League Championship Denmark, the Finnish Pro League, GGLigaen in Norway, SvenskaOnlineLigan in Sweden, and 4 Nations for the United Kingdom and Ireland. Teams play weekly matches within their divisions, each league ends with playoffs that decide promotion and relegation, and a team needs five players, most of them based in the country where it competes.
Riot does not run its regional leagues itself; each has a tournament organizer. The NLC changed hands in November 2023, when Freaks 4U Gaming, which had run it, laid off staff and turned control of the league over to the Leagues platform, The Esports Advocate reported in November 2024.
Related readFormer BoostGate players say two thirds of their TCL salaries are unpaidTeams, creators and the audience
The pay dispute sits on top of a wider debate about how the league is built. The NLC's best-known recent team, Los Ratones, the squad formed by Caedrel, won EMEA Masters twice, according to Riot, and received a guest place in LEC Versus, the new invitational that opened the 2026 season. After the team missed the LEC Versus playoffs, Caedrel, its CEO, announced on February 12 that Los Ratones was shutting down, Sheep Esports reported that day.
Caedrel has spoken about the league too. In a clip from his stream of February 16, relayed by Sheep Esports, Caedrel said that when the team revealed, around October, that it would not return, the league was trying to convince many people to create teams to join it. He said the organizers pitched the idea of making content with him and with Los Ratones.
The operator's statement ties its broadcast choices to that kind of creator-driven growth, and says the Winter Split figures support it. The people who called the matches until now say the question they want answered is simpler: when they will be paid what they say they are owed.
What comes next
Three points are open. The talks Leagues says it opened with Riot Games and other parties could run into the next week, by the operator's own account. Week 7 of the Winter Split is to be played, but the NLC has not said in what form the matches will be broadcast. And the people who spoke this week say they are still owed money that the operator says it has settled, or offered to settle on terms they reject.
Under Riot's preliminary calendar, the regional Winter Splits end on March 8 and the Spring Splits begin on March 23.
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