The big boys of the competitive scene should be trembling! Ibai Llanos and Gerard Piqué are coming to the game with a fresh international roster, and they are very (!) serious about it.
Just a few weeks ago, Ibai Llanos (former LoL caster) and Gerard Piqué (FC Barcelona football player) announced the founding of an eSports organization called "KOI". It has already begun making waves in the competitive LoL scene by defeating Karmine Corp, Rekkles' new home. But League of Legends isn't the only game where KOI plans to win some tournaments at!
The Spanish organization has also decided to invest in the Valorant roster, and after the success of VCT 2021, it's actually no surprise – we expect more and more organizations to start doing this. However, putting together a solid and successful team on such a stacked competitive scene is no easy task, especially in the EMEA region. KOI will have to show something truly exceptional to get ahead of organizations like Acend, Gambit, and Liquid. So, what are their plans? Let's look a little deeper into that.
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KOI's Valorant Roster
Let's start with who will represent KOI's Valorant team. Well, unfortunately there is no official information on that yet, although there are more and more leaks that seem to make sense. Recent reports from different sources suggest that Ibai and Piqué are interested in signing up three players from UCAM Esports Club, a Spanish university eSports team. This would be the second time KOI has decided to take players from this particular team, as they did the same for their LoL roster.
Moreover, there are more and more leaks about KOI's partnership with Joona "H1ber" Parviainen and Gabriel "starkk" Marques, former semi-pro CS:GO players who last year started winning B-tier online Valorant tournaments and have shown themselves to be players who really deserve a chance in the VCT circuit.
— starkk (@starkkval) December 26, 2021
You're not ready for him Please join us in welcoming the Finnish Demon to Finest Valorant!Joona @H1berr Parviainen #GOFINEST pic.twitter.com/jjg7fpISYo
— Team Finest (@Finest_IL) September 7, 2021
So, as for now, everything indicates that KOI's Valorant roster will look as follows:
| Real Name | Nickname | Nation | Previous Team | Role |
| Oskar Palmqvist | PHYRN | Sweden | UCAM Esports Club | Player |
| Gabriel Gessle | shrew | Sweden | UCAM Esports Club | Player |
| Ladislav Sachr | Sacake | Czech Republic | UCAM Esports Club | Player |
| Gabriel Marques | starkk | Portgual | SAW | Player |
| Joona Parviainen | H1Ber | Finland | Team Finest | Player |
| Antonio Lozano | Asaka | Spain | UCAM Esports Club | Coach |
| Sergio Rodríguez | Sikak0 | Spain | UCAM Esports Club | Assistant Coach |
However, remember that this is nothing official for now, but if you are interested in this topic, you should save this article in your bookmarks because we will surely update it as soon as we get more information.
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KOI's Strategy To Conquer The Valorant Scene
Alright, we already know that KOI will have a pretty exciting roster with a lot of potential, so let's ask ourselves – what kind of gameplan can they have? It seems like the best option for them would be to compete in one of the VRL (Valorant Regional Leagues) tournaments, through which they can get into the VCT promotion tournament and therefore get into the official tournament circuit.
The VRL season will kick off on January 24th with open qualifiers, so this is the latest we will know the KOI's Valorant roster, although it will probably happen much sooner. Meanwhile, if you are interested in the topic of Valorant eSports and the VCT circuit in general, we invite you to check out our article on the main principles of VCT 2022.