VALORANT teams in the Americas region are starting to officially come together ahead of the 2024 season. And now, the recent Last Chance Qualifier victors have revealed who is staying and which new blood is joining the fray for next year.
KRÜ Esports announced its starting roster for the VALORANT Champions Tour 2024 season today, with two new signings in rookie duelist Nicolás “mta” González and former longstanding Leviatán player Fabian “Shyy” Usnayo. The core of Nicolás “Klaus” Ferrari, Marco “Melser” Machuca, and Angelo “keznit” Mori are remaining together after the team went from winless in the regular season to winning the Americas LCQ in 2023 without dropping a single series.
KRÜ has developed a true underdog status no matter who is on its roster. It all began with their upset over Sentinels back at Champions 2021, and while the roster fluctuated, they bounced back in 2023. Despite a poor season where the team couldn’t buy a win despite playing teams like Cloud9 close, the LCQ proved to be where they finally got it together. Keznit and Santiago “Daveeys” Ruiz led the charge as KRÜ beat Leviatán to get their spot in Champions 2023.
They didn’t do much at the final tournament of 2023, but the fact they made it there was a Cinderella run that raised questions about what their offseason would look like. If they just bombed out of the LCQ, it would’ve been likely that few players would remain on KRÜ from 2023. But they went on that run, showing the potential of a strong team. Even with that hope heading into the offseason, shocking news of Daveeys’ death changed plans.
Two slots opened up on KRÜ, and as is standard for the organization, it looked toward rivals Leviatán for a potential pickup. Shyy was released by Leviatán and KRÜ is giving him a chance alongside former teammates Melser and keznit once again. As for the team’s second pickup, mta, he’s a relatively new VALORANT pro from Chile. His first competitive games were in February 2023 and he’s a duelist who was able to win the open qualifier for the Argentina Game Show tournament with his team, frequency.
Mta will still continue playing for frequency in that offline tournament, so fans can get a sneak peek as to what this wild card rookie brings to the table from Oct. 13 to 16. It looks like KRÜ is trying to repeat the miracle run it had at the end of the 2023 season, but the two new pieces will have to fill some big holes to make it happen.
