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The Valorant First Strike Europe finals concluded today with Team Heretics claiming the championship title.
After battling it out through rigorous qualifiers, both Team Heretics and SUMN FC staged an epic finale to the inaugural edition of Valorant's First Strike. First Strike is the first Riot Games-sponsored esports tournament for Valorant with regional finals being played across the globe.
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The European Finals saw a total of eight teams battle it out to be crowned the region's best Valorant team. Despite the presence of notable teams such as G2 Esports and Team Liquid, SUMN FC, an organization-less team, made their way into the grand finale.
Here's how the action unfolded in the best-of-five grand finale series from Valorant's First Strike Europe regional finals.
Valorant First Strike Europe Grand Finale
With a prize pool of $100,000, both Team Heretics and SUMN FC gave it their all in the best-of-five series. The rosters for both the teams are as follows:
Team Heretics
Christian "IoWeI" Garcia Antoran
Melih "pAura" Karaduran
Dustyn "niesoW" Durnas
Zygimantas "nukkye" Chmieliauskas
Auni "AvovA" Chahade
SUMN FC
Jake "Boaster" Howlett
Muhammad "Moe40" Hariff
James "Mistic" Orfila
Domagoj "doma" Fancev
Kostas "stack" Theodoropoulos
The best-of-five series for the First Strike Europe Grand Finale started on the Ascent map. Team Heretics hit the ground running with their Omen, Sage, Sova, Jett, and Killjoy draft against SUMN FC's draft of Breach, Sova, Jett, Omen, and Killjoy.
The first map was comfortably secured by Team Heretics as SUMN FC couldn't manage to win more than one round on Ascent. With a final scoreline of 13-1 in their favour, Team Heretics secured a lead before heading into Icebox.
SUMN FC showed a lot of resilience on the second map as they left out Breach and Omen to pick up Sage and Viper. Similarly, Team Heretics drafted Viper and Raze instead of Omen and Sova for the second match on Icebox.
However, SUMN FC completely outplayed Team Heretics on the second map. With a final scoreline of 13-7, SUMN FC brought back the best-of-five series to a 1-1 scenario with three maps to go.
For the third map of the series, Team Heretics went forward with a Sage, Sova, Omen, Raze, and Cypher draft on Haven. SUMN FC made a few changes themselves and drafted a lineup of Breach, Sova, Raze, Omen, and Killjoy.
However, the draft changes didn't seem to work for SUMN FC as Team Heretics absolutely dominated on Valorant's Haven map. With a final scoreline of 13-5, Team Heretics regained their lead while also ensuring that one more map would crown them as the best Valorant team from Europe.
With the fourth match of the series taking place on Bind, SUMN FC changed their draft massively before heading into the game. With an Omen, Sova, Raze, Viper, and Cypher lineup, SUMN FC put up a stellar performance against Team Heretics to try and force a fifth match.
However, Team Heretics made a small change in their draft and picked Brimstone instead of Omen. This gave them all the extra utility they needed. Just when SUMN FC was on the verge of enforcing Overtime in the fourth match, Team Heretics secured the round, map, and championship with a final scoreline of 13-11.
Thus, with a final score of 3-1 in their favour, Team Heretics was crowned the best Valorant team from Europe after the First Strike regional finals.
