VALORANT Masters: Sentinels Dominate, EU Fight Back

After collapsing in the Opening Matches, Fnatic and Liquid have begun tearing the other regions apart in the Lower Bracket. That includes Version1 from North America as well. Now, they’re bound to clash, however, and only one EU representative will get a shot at reaching the Grand Finals. There, Sentinels are already lying in wait as the top favorites.

Crazy Raccoons and Sharks Esports were the first to exit VALORANT Masters. But their opponents also didn’t get much further, as Fnatic and Liquid booted them off the server in the second Lower Bracket round. After this point, the EU dominance started to solidify.

The performances we’ve seen out of NUTURN are just as impressive. So far, they had managed to stay safe from Liquid and Fnatic by surviving in the Upper Bracket. But now, they’ve also succumbed to Sentinels and are down to the Lower Bracket Finals. Earlier, however, they managed to post impressive results versus Sharks and overcame Version1 in a nailbiter 2-1 series.

After Vikings put up a solid display in their first game, they followed this up with two quick losses to Sentinels and Liquid. They were obviously a little unlucky in their opponent drafts, but the rest of the teams didn’t really have it any easier. After all, Liquid and Fnatic are now spearheading the Lower Bracket. Alongside NUTURN, they have to decide on who gets to catch up to Sentinels.

ARE SENTINELS ALREADY THE WINNERS?

At the start of the event, Fnatic were able to at least mount two-digit scorelines versus Tyson “TenZ” Ngo and company. Nonetheless, they fell on two maps. In the following matches, both Vikings and NUTURN failed to cross the 13 points total threshold for the entire series, respectively. The Sentinels dominance is clear as day. The structure of the Grand Finals is playing into their hands even more.

All the teams who barely managed to compete on two maps against these NA representatives will now have to potentially play out five maps. The Best-of-Five format gives Sentinels even more room to impress. Those are all perfect reasons to consider this team as the winners and even trophy holders already. But there is a slim chance at competition, which is embodied by one single individual.

DERKE, THE TOURNAMENT MVP SO FAR

Even with Sentinels dominating this much, the player scoreboard is being led by Nikita “derke” Sirmitev. With an ACS of 301.8, he has even pulled ahead of TenZ and Adil “ScreaM” Benrlitom. The numbers obviously show that he is the frontrunner for Fnatic. The fact that he can even outgun TenZ is great news for the remainder of the event. However, his team first has to get past Liquid, who have their own top gunners in the form of ScreaM and Elias “Jamppi” Olkkönnen. So who will end up on top?

This question will dominate the last two days of the event. Sentinels have shown their prowess, but after settling into the competition, Liquid and Fnatic have both improved their performances by a lot. NUTURN can still steal the show from these EU teams. At the end of the day, TenZ, Shahzeb “ShahZaM” Khan and his men hold most of the cards and look to make it a quick Grand Finals for the tournament victory.