WePlay has announced a new league which will focus on helping academy teams thrive and bring out their true skill levels.

All competing teams must have a minimum of 4 players under the age of 20, WePlay has already partnered with eight organisations for the event, which will feature a $100,000 pool.

The teams announced for the event are; VP.Prodigy, mouz NXT, NAVI Junior, Young Ninjas, Astralis Talent, Fnatic Rising, FURIA Academy & BIG Academy. It is worth noting that the exact details for Fnatic Rising are yet to be announced, including who will featuring the pool of players for the team. According to NAVI's COO 'Aleksey Kucherov', “The league provides an excellent platform for the young prodigies to show themselves, competing against their counterparts from other clubs. There’s also the process of getting ready to play against certain opponents and the long-term planning of roster changes for playing certain roles." Overall, it sounds like the event is to truly train the academy players in what a pro tournament is like, and to make sure those players are able to keep performing with all the additional pressure of these big money events.

"There will be media days and interviews, the players will develop as individuals. In general, there will be everything that’s already present in Tier 1 CS:GO, everything you need to get used to at the very early stages of your career as a pro gamer.

Academy teams are a good way for all teams to grow talent outside of their main professional pool, so as to not be too risky too early on with new players. Major organisations are currently entertaining the idea of individual academy teams, with mousesports only recently announcing their NXT side team, who are already proving a force in their matches, so far winning 4 out of 5 matches in the Pinnacle Cup II event. Ninjas in Pyjamas, who now usually formally go by just 'NIP' have run an academy team for a long time, with 'Young Ninjas' also proving a huge upcoming force. Organisations sometimes play about with rosters, and introduce players from academy teams into the main roster allowing them to experience what its truly like at LAN events, where a lot extra occurs such as interviews and the whole deal with being on camera nearly all the time.