A few minutes after they lost to
Team Liquid Brazil in the grand final of the
VALORANT Game Changers
Championship,
Shopify Rebellion Gold held an emotional post-match press conference. The players and staff offered an honest look at what it takes to compete at the top, reflecting on map preparation and bracket decisions, praising their opponents, and sharing heartfelt words about their year-long journey together.
Shopify now leaves Seoul
without the crown they have worn for two years.
Question for Loic "effys" Sauvageau
What the preparation looked like for Bind, and what, if anything, would you have done differently?
effys: "Honestly, we didn’t really think about Bind much at all. This was probably the most fun we’ve had in a while playing a map, especially on the defensive side. I don’t think we walked away from that game feeling particularly bad. In our heads, it was almost a “write-off” map, we assumed it would be a loss. It actually ended up being much closer than we expected, considering we hadn’t played it in something like two years. When we got to ten rounds, we were thinking, "They’re the ones who might be tilted right now". I actually think the real turning point in the series was Pearl rather than Bind. I don’t see Bind as a swing map in this series at all. I think we simply had to close out Pearl, and we didn’t. Bind, for us, had almost nothing to do with the overall outcome.
What would you say you could improve on from this match?
effys: To be honest, it’s not really about today. I think we were put in a difficult position from the very start. What hurt us the most isn’t this series, but the loss we had two days ago in the upper bracket against the same team. We took a big risk by keeping a map in the pool that we simply don’t play. The moment you also have a second map that’s a bit shaky, if you end up in a series like this, you leave yourself almost no place for error. There are a lot of things I personally could have done much better for that first match against them, and I didn’t. A lot of that is on me. These are things that should have been fixed before we even got to this grand final.
It’s mostly in-game details that I’ll keep to myself, but many aspects weren’t working going into that upper-bracket match, and I didn’t address them properly. So, for me, the real damage was done there. Coming into today, as I said, we had a map we don’t play in the pool, which almost puts us at 0–1 down from the start, and another map where we’re not particularly strong. It puts us in a very uncomfortable position. So I don’t think what I learned is specifically about today; it’s more about that previous loss in the upper bracket and how it set the stage for what happened here."
Question for Karnthida "dodonut" Chaisrakeo
Could you reflect on this season with the team, what you’ve learned from playing with them, and which moments you’re proudest of?
dodonut: "My thoughts are a little blurred right now, but I can say I have no regrets about playing with this team. I think we all worked very hard throughout the entire year. I don’t think this best-of-five really shows how good we are or how hard we’ve worked to get here. There isn’t just one thing I’ve learned from them, there are many. I can’t list them all off the top of my head, but I think it’s clear from my performances over the year that I’ve learned a lot."
Photo by Christina Oh/Riot Games
Questions for Melanie "meL" Capone and Sarah "sarahcat" Simpson
2026 is coming very soon, and we’re expecting you to at least take a break. What is the next goal for the team, and what is the next step for you?
sarahcat: "We’re going to need some time to collect our thoughts and figure out what we even want to do next. We’ve been so locked in all year that, right now, I honestly don’t know."
meL: "Taking a break is a goal in itself. We’re actually very bad at doing that; we’re not particularly good at taking time off. So genuinely stepping back, resting, and spending time with our loved ones is going to be important.
You were saying something to Natalia "daiki" Vilela right after the game ended. It looked like a very emotional moment. What did you tell her?
meL: "I’ll probably talk to her more about it later tonight, but I was basically telling her that she played an incredible event and an incredible series. She called amazingly, played amazingly, and she was clearly very deserving of the MVP award. And I told her: take this momentum and go make it to Challengers. I feel like they’ve reached that level now. I genuinely think they can make that push and finally break that barrier, and I’m really looking forward to seeing that happen.
Despite the loss, are you still satisfied with your journey this year, and would you follow the same path if you could start over?
meL: Yes. Qualifying for Challengers was probably the happiest day of my entire year.
We’ve seen, in the past year, several transitions from Game Changers to tier-one in regions. Which five players would you pick from the teams here, and which tier-one team would you put them on?
meL: My thoughts are quite cloudy right now; it’s hard for me to even remember all the teams that played at this event. First and foremost, I’m obviously going to root for my teammates. I will always put them before anyone else here. I’ve played with them, I know how they think about the game, and I’ve seen how much they’ve improved this year. So if I had to pick five players, it would absolutely be my teammates. Actually, I will go back to something I said earlier when I was asked about a role model in Game Changers, and I mentioned daiki. I meant that sincerely. I think there has been a shortage of Brazilian IGLs, and we’ve seen that with teams like FURIA and LOUD, in terms of having strong homegrown leadership. And I think she’s right there. Today, it was genuinely difficult for me to play against her, both on an individual level and at a macro level. She made our lives very complicated."
Header Credit Photo: Moon Suwon/Riot Games
