Mesut Özil may have retired from international play last month, but he’ll be filling some of his new-found spare time by creating his own esports team.
Announcing the news via Twitter, the Arsenal F.C. midfielder revealed that he has teamed up with eSportsReputation to form his own FIFA 19 squad.
The recruitment process for FIFA 19 – which will be released on September 28th – will begin “in the upcoming weeks”, with Özil and his partner looking for players to represent him at both national and international levels.
While the team’s name hasn’t been explicitly stated, Özil’s tweet does say “#teamozil”, so that may just be it. Though it may not be the most inventive team name in esports, it’ll be rather clear that the players he chooses to recruit are representing the former German national player.
eSportsReputation is based in Berlin-based esports agency that manages professional esports athletes, typically working in the FIFA scene: representing the likes of Cihan “Cihan” Yasarlar, Kai “deto” Wollin, and Thomas “Janthana” Temperli. The agency also manages League of Legends player Tristan “PowerOfEvil” Schrage.
Özil is far from the being the first footballer to start to his esports team, of course. Just in June, Leicester City’s Christian Fuchs expanded his #NoFuchsGiven lifestyle brand into esports by entering FIFA.
Esports Insider says: We’re seeing more and more football clubs entering FIFA, but not so much with individual players – especially with as much prominence in the sport as Özil. We understand that FIFA is the most logical step into the industry for those in the football industry, but it goes without saying that there’s a plethora of esports out there beyond FIFA. Hopefully Özil and his new partner recognise this as they’d no doubt be welcome in other titles too, but for now, it’s just encouraging that somebody of his stature, fame, and prowess has decided to enter the scene.