London Spitfire adds Reprize as head coach

British Hurricane alumnus CommanderX will be joining him as assistant coach.

Photo by Robert Paul via Blizzard Entertainment

The London Spitfire’s big reconstruction now has two new faces to lead the process.

Recommended Videos

Former Los Angeles Valiant coach Justin “Reprize” Hand will be the Spitfire’s new head coach during the 2021 Overwatch League season, the team announced today. He’ll be joined by British Hurricane coach Xavier “CommanderX” Hardy, who will step into the assistant coach role.  

During the 2020 offseason, the London Spitfire organization announced that it’d be embarking on a complete rebuild of the team. After Ysabel “Noukky” Müeller was appointed as general manager last month, she confirmed that the team would be focused on Western talent. The appointments of Reprize and CommanderX fit this new model.  

Reprize has spent time in the Overwatch League already, having coached the Los Angeles Valiant during the 2019 season. He also coached Mayhem Academy in Overwatch Contenders North America. He took a brief break over the past year to become the owner of Revival, a team in Contenders North America built from the pieces of the now-defunct Mayhem Academy. 

CommanderX has been a coach for the London Spitfire’s Contenders Europe academy team, British Hurricane, since late 2019. The British Hurricane have won the last four monthly tournaments in Contenders Europe, as well as the 2020 Season 1 Contenders Europe championship. 

In an interview for the Spitfire, Noukky said she wanted a close relationship between the Overwatch League team and the wildly successful British Hurricane academy team. Bringing up two critical members of the Contenders scene is a way to solidify that relationship. 

The London Spitfire has not yet added any new players in the offseason, but the organization has hinted at signing reveals in the near future.   

Author
Image of Liz Richardson
Liz Richardson
Liz is a freelance writer and editor from Chicago. Her favorite thing is the Overwatch League; her second favorite thing is pretending iced coffee is a meal. She specializes in educational content, patch notes that (actually) make sense, and aggressively supporting Tier 2 Overwatch. When she's not writing, Liz is expressing hot takes on Twitter and making bad life choices at Target.