Report: Football club Schalke 04 to buy LOL team Elements

The League of Legends team Elements has supposedly finalized talks with German football club FC Schalke 04, with the latter set to take over the team and its spot in the European LCS, Esports Observer writes. The deal will supposedly be revealed officially next week.

Elements' story dates back to late 2013, when the team formed under the Alliance brand. A change to the rules about team ownership forced the squad to rebrand in early 2015, and the team has been known as Elements since then.

Elements have been a fixture in the EU LCS, the top European league, ever since joining. Their results have been disappointing lately, though. Following an unsatisfying 2015 season, the team brought on a new squad for the 2016 Spring split, but results still failed to materialize. They finished regular season play with 6 wins and 12 losses.

Supposedly the team has been looking for a buyer since November, but couldn't close a deal before the Spring split began.

Schalke 04 isn't the first football club to move into esports. Besiktas signed a Turkish League of Legends team last year (and have since let them go), and clubs like Wolfsburg and West Ham have signed FIFA players. But Schalke will be the first club to move into League of Legends at the highest level, seeing as the European LCS is one of the most competitive LOL leagues in the world, topped only by the Chinese and Korean leagues.