FNS explains why Sentinels Valorant Champions run may be doomed to fail

Pujan ‘FNS’ Mehta has predicted that Sentinels will not get out of the group stage at Valorant Champions 2024. He broke down their issue and why he thinks the team won’t be able to rebound at the event during a co-stream.

Sentinels came into the Valorant World Championships without much momentum, losing their two matches leading up to the event. The North American team lost its first group stage match against Gen.G 2-0 and is now set for a lower bracket match against FunPlus Phoenix on August 8.

NRG Esports’ FNS has been vocal with his prediction that Sentinels won’t do much at this event, and he detailed his take on an August 2 co-stream of the tournament.

“The highs that Sentinels went through at the beginning of the year are the greatest, they feel so good… Then the lows, aka what’s been happening to them the last 2-3 months, are genuinely devastating… Mentally, they can break you,” he said.

The VCT Masters Reykjavík champion said he doesn’t see the team pulling out of that hole of negative emotions and form in 2024 or at Valorant Champions.

FNS also called out fans pointing to coaching as the issue with Sentinels after someone in his chat asked for his thoughts on the team’s head coach saying players “just have to lock in” after losses.

“You guys are overly criticizing a team because they are losing. If they were winning you wouldn’t care if kaplan said those exact words over and over again,” FNS said.

“Because they are losing you are saying that could be a reason… Realistically it could just be form-related. There are so many things that are more realistically an issue with Sentinels than what people think.”

Sentinels started the year by winning the VCT Americas Kickoff tournament then rode that momentum to a Masters Madrid trophy. However, the squad missed out on Masters Shanghai after going 2-3 in VCT Americas Stage 1.

The team rebounded slightly in Stage 2, going 3-1. However, Sentinels still had to rely on other teams to finish poorly during the playoff stage to qualify for Valorant Champions.

Sentinels also dealt with issues outside of the server leading up to the tournament, like how they were voted the “most overrated” team at the World Championship by a panel of 100 VCT pros.

Whether Sentinels will flame out of Valorant Champions remains to be seen, but the squad doesn’t seem to have much positive momentum ahead of their elimination match against FPX.