Reigning League of Legends world champion FunPlus Phoenix has announced the signing of its first professional VALORANT roster. The FPX VALORANT starting-five is made up in tandem of players from Sweden's FABRIKEN and Russia's Party Parrots, No. 5 and No. 8 in the most-recent ESPN European VALORANT rankings, respectively.
FPX's starting-five is as follows: Pontus "Zyppan" Eek, Andrey "Shao" Kiprsky, Kirill "ANGE1" Karasiow, Johan "Meddo" Renbjörk and Tobias "shadow" Flodström.
Although a Chinese organization, this entry into VALORANT is a move for FPX to become a global esports powerhouse.
The team will make their debut during this week's latest Ignition Series event in partnership with game developer Riot Games, the Allied Esports Odyssey, a six-team tournament featuring G2 Esports, Team Liquid, Ninjas in Pyjamas, Turkey's BBL Esports and Spain's Giants Gaming. FPX's first match will be in the round-robin group stage on Tuesday when it takes on Team Liquid, who is also making its official debut in VALORANT after recently signing the best European team during the game's closed beta Fish123.
FPX, though from China, are no stranger to the teams populating the European VALORANT scene, having faced off with G2 Esports at the most-recent League of Legends world championship final. In front of a sold-out crowd at AccorHotels Arena, FPX's all-Chinese squad defeated the home crowd favorites G2 in a devastating sweep, winning the organization its first world championship. Since G2's creation of its VALORANT squad in early July, the team has gone undefeated, winning all three previous Ignition Series tournaments held in Europe. FPX and G2 are set to reignite their rivalry in another Riot Games competitive title with the world's champion entrance into VALORANT.
VALORANT's fledging esports scene has been on the rise of late, the most recent North American Ignition Series event, the FaZe Clan Invitational, peaking at over 180,000 concurrent viewers during its final between TSM and Sentinels.