The international Veterans, LOUD, put up a strong fight but the number 1 seed from APAC were too much for the Brazilians to handle with a 2-1 victory sending LOUD one game away from elimination.
Despite Less having the most frags across the three maps, he alone wasn’t enough to defeat GenG who seemed formidable in their play.
Stats Courtesy of vlr.gg
LOUD brought another Ascent comp to the table with Quick playing Yoru and finding no success against the GenG traditional comp on Ascent of Jett, Killjoy, KAY/0, Omen and Sova.
The first map, Icebox, went GenG’s way with a ridiculous clutch from Karon on his international debut against Less of all people. Less put up 27 frags on the Icebox but it wasn’t enough and a stick of the defuse was the end of Icebox.
🇰🇷 GEN.G END THE FIRST DAY OF MADRID WITH A WIN OVER 🇧🇷 LOUD, 2-1!
The Breeze did go the way of LOUD, with TuyZ activating and dropping 22 frags with GenG’s Yoru comp not getting much use and only dropping 9 frags despite t3xture going 21/18 on the Jett and having some crazy entries. He was also confusing fans across the world by only using the phantom, which was confusing because of the natural long distance fights that will occur on a map like Breeze.
This game sends LOUD down to the 0-1 games potentially face FPX after they lost to KC earlier in the day. The draw for the following games is yet to happen since there are 2 more games today with Edward Gaming facing off against Paper Rex and Team Heretics facing off against Sentinels to find the next games in this Swiss system.
The first game of VCT Masters Madrid has kicked off with a statement 2-0 victory over Chinese side FPX.
The number 1 seed from EMEA takes down the number 2 seed from the Chinese league asserting their dominance on the international stage for the first time since Lock-In last year.
Stats courtesy of vlr.gg
N4RRATE put up huge numbers going +19 on the initiator role. They played the same as fans have been watching in EMEA where they play slow and find out information that is critical to them getting the crucial rounds and eventually leads to their win.
FPX came into the game looking for their first international win after not having any success in their previous tournaments. Life, previously of Edward Gaming, was showing up with 41 frags on the Reyna and the Chamber, agents that arent used to full effect usually in the pro scene.
He managed an incredible Reyna ace on Icebox to put some pressure onto KC but in the end, the French side was too much and denied the Chinese side their first international win.
The second map was Lotus with FPX abandoning the usual Killjoy or Cypher for a Chamber which eventually lent towards their downfall as going up 8-4 at the half, their defensive side only gave them 2 rounds ending the game 13-10.
As this Masters is a Swiss format, so both teams will play another game and first teams to go to 2 wins will proceed and if FPX play their follow on game and lose it, they will be eliminated from Masters Madrid.
With all the teams finalised for the first Masters of the 2024 VCT Season, there are many players that are making their first international LAN debut with many teams from across the world including 4 out of the 5 from Team Heretics.
In this article, we will list 5 players to keep an eye on this Masters with some players firing into the season from their upset wins in their regions and new champions being crowned across all of the regions.
5. Dominykas ‘MiniBoo‘ Lukaševičius
MiniBoo, as the name states, is the younger brother of his teammate, Boo. They are a brother duo that took EMEA by storm with Boo on the Controller and MiniBoo on the duelist role.
They qualified through EMEA Kick-off by defeating FUTEsports and the once kings, NaVi. They defied all the odds with a team of players with an average age of 19 and the signing of many T2 players and a previous Fortnite superstar, Benjyfishy.
MiniBoo took fans by surprise in their qualification game for Masters against NaVi dropping a 49/29 KD and going 24/6 on Yoru for them to close out a 2-0 victory over the old FPX roster.
Coming into Masters they are on fire but their young roster and inexperience at LAN could cause them to fall at the first hurdle that is Sentinels.
4. Kim ‘t3xture’ Na-ra
After GenG made a surprising run through APAC to actually get the number 1 seed into Masters Madrid over Paper Rex, their star duelist player, t3xture, sent waves across APAC with his Raze movement and aim that would fill the hole of Jinggg very well despite being on a different team.
GenG were in group C and despite beating RRQ in their opening game they did lose to Paper Rex in a close 2-1 game to drop down to play-ins and eventually made it all the way to final without losing one game.
They beat Paper Rex in the final in a 3-1 dominating game with t3xture top fragging the lobby with 65 kills on Raze and Jett, outfragging international superstars such as something, f0rsaken and Monyet.
3. Martin ‘marteen’ Pátek
Another roster that shocked the world was Karmine Corp. With their shocking year last year with many memorable moments for the worst reasons, they bounced back with a brand new roster only keeping sh1n from their old roster and completely revamping bringing in 3 duelist players and moving them around on different agents.
marteen was the perfect choice for their main duelist with his very high sensitvity, he performs flashy flicks and kills onto the best players in the region dropping ACS of near 400 in some maps.
He really showed up when it was most crucial against FNATIC when we went 40/26 against the best team of 2023 and is running the Yoru composition that had FNATIC struggling and eventually sent them home 2-0 after a shock result in the EMEA region.
It will be his first LAN however, but they will be facing off against FPX, who could be considered the worst team at the tournament.
2. Tyson ‘TenZ‘ Ngo
TenZ has always been a talking point when it comes to LAN performance as Sentinels haven’t made an invitational LAN in over 3 years. However, this year, the most clouted organisation in VALORANT made it to Masters in astonishing fashion defeating superteams Leviatan, NRG and LOUD to make the number 1 seed from VCT Americas.
It was the team that came together and really put on a performance for the fans at home but there was nothing but positives for the canadian who has gone from the primary duelist role onto the Omen, KAY/0 and Yoru this year.
His Omen has been a spectacle to watch as he still has that duelist mentality on Omen dropping 30 kills to take Sunset from NRG and then having an MVP performance against LOUD in the Grand final of Kick-off against LOUD dropping 84 frags across the 5 maps going +14 in KD.
1. Marshall ‘N4RRATE‘ Massey
The biggest surprise of the VCT 2024 Kick-off was the NA import to Karmine Corp, N4RRATE, putting up crazy numbers on the initiator role for the French megaside.
He spent last year in the second tier of NA Valorant on MAD Lions where they had an average year, and N4RRATE was on the primary duelist role still dropping good numbers. His performance caught the attention of NRG where he was reported to be trailing for the side and was their number 1 choice before Demon1 became available to them and they couldn’t pass up that opportunity.
This year he has shocked the world with his performance over in EMEA, asking the question of whether or not NA VALORANT is too saturated and has so many talented players sat in the 2nd tier whilst the superstars take the top flight spots.
This Masters will be his first event so there is always the chance of the LAN and the opportunity getting to him, but if he can perform as he was against FNATIC where he Raze diffed Derke, he has a real chance to leave an impact on the world of VALORANT and have another crazy rookie year, similar to Demon1 on EG last year.
There are many more players that haven’t been mentioned such as:
Zachary ‘Zekken’ Patrone
Zheng ‘Zmjjkk’ Yongkang
Felipe ‘Less‘ de Loyola
Benjy ‘BenjyFishy‘ David Fish
This Masters Madrid will not have NRG, FNATIC or DRX there giving a big change from last year and not allowing FNATIC to defend their Masters Championship and allowing for a new holder to be crowned.
Will Sentinels regain their former glory and take home another Masters or will a new Champion be etched into VCT history?
Masters Madrid begins on the 14th of March at 15:00 GMT with Karmine Corp facing off against FunPlus Pheonix.
Power Pitches 