LOUD loses multiple members to illness.
The VCT LOCK//IN starts in just a few more hours time with 32 teams from three of the the franchised league's best regions as well as two invited teams from China. Teams will be playing in a best-of-three, single-elimination bracket with the winner not only walking away with one-fifth of the 500,000 USD total prize pool, but also grant its region with an additional slot to Masters 2023.
And to kickstart the campaign, the VCT has announced that it has postponed the defending champions, LOUD's opening match to close out the first day of the LOCK//IN after losing multiple members to sickness. Now representing the Americas, LOUD will have to wait to defend their title against Gen.G Esports.
The team was given an additional two days in order to give the players of LOUD more time to rest and recover. This is to ensure that the team will still be able to field their starting lineup. They are now scheduled to play on February 15, right after day three of the VCT LOCK//IN.
LOUD versus Gen.G will take place after MIBR versus Talon Esports. Cloud9 and Paper Rex kicks off day three with Evil Geniuses and Team Heretics playing the second match of the day.
Whomever wins in the LOUD versus Gen.G match-up will move on to face the winner between the defending champs and the Stage 2 Masters winners in Copenhagen, FunPlus Phoenix and Karmine Corp. This also puts a stop to LOUD's short-stone rivalry with OpTic Gaming, who went one-up against the Brazilian's in both the Stage 1 and 2 Masters last year. Of course, LOUD ended up having the last laugh by winning VCT Champions.
And with LOUD being hometown heroes, fans will be disappointed to hear that they won't be able to catch their team in action on day one. Thankfully, the VCT has found a way to compensate fans attending the VCT LOCK//IN on February 13.
All ticket holders for the day will still be able to attend the matches while also gaining an additional free ticket for February 15. If you chose to not attend the first day of matches, you can still choose to show up on the 15th and receive a complimentary ticket by showing an unused ticket for the 13th. Additionally, if you'd like to get a full refund for your ticket, you can do so through Ticket360.
LOUD's head coach, Daniel "fRoD" Montaner also issued an update on the team's current state of health ahead of their match against Gen.G at the VCT LOCK//IN press conference.
Everyone's doing great. We've been resting, making sure that we're taking the right medication, and lots of vitamins. The guys just really need a lot of rest. So we've been focusing these last several days on getting as much sleep as we can. For someone like myself and Cauan (cauanzin), we've been feeling one hundred percent for a couple of days now. So no issues there [...] and everyone will be good to go hopefully in the next 24 hours, everyone's on the path to improvement and slowly but surely everyone will feel 100%.
Daniel "fRoD" Montaner, Head Coach of LOUD VALORANT.
Be sure to catch the start of the VCT LOCK//IN later today with KOI versus NRG. This is followed up by Detonation FocusMe and Giant. Check out all the action on the official VCT Twitch channel.
