Day 9 of
VALORANT Champions 2026 ended with G2 Esports and Nongshim RedForce confirming their spots in the playoffs stage, defeating Team Liquid and Karmine Corp respectively. Three teams from VCT Americas have now qualified for playoffs, with LOUD having the chance to make it all four if they can win against Global Esports.
On the other hand, it was a disappointing day for VCT EMEA as their champions and runner-ups from Stage 2 were eliminated. This leaves Team Vitality as the only EMEA team to qualify for playoffs, with FUT Esports in the running as well.
Another 1-2 for Liquid
It’s yet another international tournament where Team Liquid exit with a 1-2 record, failing to make playoffs. Once again, they have no one to blame but themselves for fumbling at the most important hurdle. The EMEA 2nd seed simply threw too many winnable rounds on their map pick, Split, which allowed G2 Esports to take the lead in the series.
Despite a respectable four round Defense half on Abyss, one of the most Attack sided maps in the game, it simply was not enough on G2’s map pick as they closed out the series in clean 2-0 fashion. Initiator Trent “trent” Cairns was the standout player for G2, and he was supported quite well by the rest of the team. On the other side, it was an underwhelming performance from TL’s IGL Ayaz “nAts” Akhmetshin, as he went -13 across both maps.
The Blue Wall crumbles
The second match of the day wasn’t easier for VCT EMEA as Karmine Corp fell 1-2 to Nongshim RedForce. The EMEA champions had a strong start on Sunset thanks to Marshall “N4RRATE” Massey and Dmitrii “SUYGETSU” Iliushin putting up 43 kills between them. However, NS came back with a vengeance on Summit and Haven by limiting KC to a single Attack round across both maps.
Masters Santiago MVP Lee “Dambi” Hyuk-kyu absolutely locked in on Summit and Haven alongside Goo “Rb” Sang-min. KC’s Controller Zhumagali “dos9” Dastan had a particularly rough series which added to the team’s woes. Nongshim RedForce are now the second VCT Pacific team to lock in a playoffs stage spot, with Global Esports having the chance to make it three if they can defeat LOUD.
