VCT 2022 EMEA LCQ Roundup

Will OG London United be the cinderella story of 2022 EMEA LCQ? How far can nAts push M3C? Is G2 worthy of the third EMEA slot at Champions Istanbul? Tune in to find out.

EMEA Last Chance Qualfier

All of the teams participating in the EMEA Valorant Champions Tour have collected circuit points over the past two stages leading up to this moment. The top two teams — Fnatic and FunPlus Phoenix — have already secured their spot at Valorant Champions 2022 in Istanbul.

With the competition starting in less than a month, it’s time to figure out who the third European representative will be. That’s the purpose of this Last Chance Qualifier, in which the remaining eight of the top 10 European Valorant teams will battle it out through a double-elimination bracket. All of the matches will be best-of-three series except for the Grand Final, which will be a best-of-five.

Upper bracket EMEA LCQ

The upper bracket kicked off with OG London United getting an easy 2-0 win over G2 Esports, but the spotlight was on the second match of the day. The winners of Valorant Champions 2021, Ascend, were facing off against Gambit Esports, now known as M3 Champions. The Russian-based team had to sever ties with their organization and since they were the winners of the Stage 3 Masters in Berlin in 2021, they now compete under this banner. Europe’s biggest Valorant rivalry in 2021 delivered, with a 2-1 win for M3C spearheaded by Master Berlin MVP, Ayaz “nAts” Akhmetshin.

Him and Bogdan “Sheydos” Naumov continued to exert their dominance on top of the precise team play, leading to a 2-1 win over OG LND UNT in the second round of the upper bracket. With this, they are qualified for the upper bracket final where they will meet Team Liquid on August 13 at 2 pm CEST. Team Liquid got here with two easy 2-0 series against BBL and NaVI, in which their entire team outperformed their opponents.

Lower bracket EMEA LCQ

BBL Esports bowed out of the competition after another 2-0 loss, this time in the lower bracket, courtesy of Guild Esports. Ascend’s tournament run and season also ended after losing 2-1 to G2 Esports and Guild would get 2-0 by London United two days later. Considering the caliber and former achievements of the players on these two rosters that might not make it through franchising, we might see them representing different colors next season.

G2 took care of business with a 2-0 win against NaVi in the lower bracket semifinals and will now face off against OG London United. The winner of this match will face off against the loser of the TL and M3C match in the lower bracket final. We’ll likely see round two of this match-up in the Grand Finals as well, considering how both teams have looked over the past few days.

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