Fresh off a great debut year, Gentle Mates are already locking in the players who made their formula successful. Sources told Sheep Esports that Martyna “Marti” Pabian and Iman “Nami” Nagaaoui are set to renew their contracts with the French organization for the upcoming year.
2026 was Gentle Mates’ first year in
VALORANT Game Changers, and it was historic. M8 made an immediate impact, winning Stage 1 and later qualifying for an international event:
Game Changers Championship São Paulo. That rapid success stemmed largely from a roster built on players with years of prior experience across different Game Changers organizations. Marti spent years across projects such as Twisted Minds Orchid, NASR Ignite, Alien Anonymo, and DVM GC before finally joining Gentle Mates in 2026.
Nami’s journey has also been pretty long, and it actually crossed with Marti’s one even before they joined Gentle Mates. She got her shot in the scene in 2023 with NASR Ignite, where she met her current teammate; after that, Nami played with GIANTX GC and Zerance Mint before the French org picked her up.
With Emine “berryx” Çoban and Gülce “wens” Sürmeli expected to stay for another year, adding Marti and Nami means four-fifths of the roster is set to remain the same going into next season. Marti was frequently a standout performer throughout the year, even in the Stage 3 grand final.
Despite Gentle Mates falling 2-3 to G2 Gozen, she ended the series with a monstrous 88/70/18 K/D/A.
Nami shouldn’t be underrated either: despite carrying the added pressure of shotcalling as the team’s IGL,
she still closed the hardest series of the year with a strong 75/72/34, proving she can balance leadership with mechanical output. Locking this core could also be a crucial factor beyond Game Changers itself, since the VCT EMEA slots are set for re-evaluation ahead of 2027.
