Five players to watch at VALORANT Masters Santiago 2026

VALORANT Masters Santiagothe first global VCT event of the year, kicks off next week and looks to be one of the most difficult tournaments to predict in VCT history.

The 12 teams, all winners of the exciting Kickoff events, will be looking to claim a total of $1m (~£742,000) in total prize money as possible and valuable VCT points.

With plenty of seasoned veterans and hungry newcomers headed to Chile, Esports Insider discusses five players who have the potential to excite the VCT crowd and carry their teams to international competition.

For all VCT EMEA Kickoff 2026, Martin ‘marteen‘ Pátek made waves like no other. As a new part Gentle Friends list, a former member of Karmine Corp has established himself as Yoru’s amazing player in terms of explosiveness and reliability.

The start of the 2026 season saw Marteen perform his duties consistently for Yoru, while other Gentle Mates players stood out. However, as the season progressed, the Czech seemed to warm up mechanically.

Following the first run of VCT EMEA, Gentle Mates found themselves in the Upper Bracket Final against BBL Esports. Despite bringing 105 kills and breaking the VCT EMEA kill record in a best-of-five (BO5) series, marteen and his team could not win the first regional seed at Masters Santiago, losing 2-3.

But instead of accepting defeat after such a crushing success, marteen returned to the VCT EMEA stage the next day to break the BO5 world kill record with 126 kills. With this performance, Gentle Mates won the Middle Bracket Final against Fnatic 3-2 and secured their ticket to Santiago.

Gentle Mates will play in the opening match of Masters Santiago against VCT China’s EDward Gaming (EDG) on February 28 at 5 PM BST. This will also be Marteen’s first chance at this event to show that he can stay at the top level following two outstanding performances. .

FURIA data GianFrancothe koalanoob‘ Potestio has been competing in VALORANT since 2020.

However, the Canadian/Italian player had a disappointing first season with the VCT EMEA NAVI team last year. After early eliminations in both VCT Kickoff and Stage 1, koalanoob was benched and replaced by Alex’.alexiik‘ Hawlasek for the rest of the season.

For the 2026 season, koalanoob returned to VCT as part of the FURIA program restructuring. The Brazilian sports federation also faced a disastrous 2025 season, winning just one game out of 13 total VCT Americas games.

Both koalanoob and FURIA entered the VCT Americas Kickoff 2026 as underdogs and quickly surpassed the expectations of the spectators by defeating KRÜ Esports (2-0), Sentinels (2-0) and three-time VCT Americas 2025 champion G2 Esports (2-1).

Completing their flawless Kickoff performance, FURIA defeated new American super team MIBR 3-2 in the Upper Bracket Final.

Despite being on the bench last year, koalanoob stood out at the VCT Americas Kickoff thanks to his versatility and unwavering mental toughness. As FURIA’s hypeman, he has managed to top his team’s leaderboard in every single game. In addition, koalanoob’s agent pool allows him to be a fearless second player and switch to Omen whenever needed.

Koalanoob is clearly hungry to prove himself in the first division, and his first ever international VCT event is the perfect opportunity to do so. His first show at VALORANT Santiago, however, will not take place until the event’s Swiss Stage is completed.

In 2024, Lee’Dambi‘ Hyuk-kyu rose from the Pacific Challengers circuit to the first division alongside the Korean team Nongshim RedForce.

Due to a slow start to their first VCT Pacific season and not making the Stage 2 Playoffs, Nongshim RedForce had to defend their tier-one slot with another run at Ascension. With that in mind, it’s hard to imagine such a sluggish team rising to the top in one of the VCT’s most competitive regions just a few months later.

However the current, fast and chaotic meta suits Nongshim perfectly, and no one else seems to thrive in this playstyle like Dambi. Looking incredibly comfortable in Neon, Dambi fulfilled the role of a player who is not afraid to come in, slipping through the middle to create space for his teammates.

This role can be a bit unforgiving, as local skirmishers tend to be dominated by the enemy, resulting in less-than-ideal stat lines. However, due to his unpredictable movements and his skill with guns, Dambi proved that Neon is fearless and deadly.

Given his incredible impact in the rotation and rotation, against Nongshim RedForce it seems to come down to one question: Can the team shut down Dambi?

So far, many attempts to stop Dambi from taking over the game have failed. But with new international opponents approaching, VALORANT Masters Santiago could be a challenge for Nongshim RedForce and its star player.

Nongshim RedForce and Dambi will begin their first global event at the Masters Santiago Playoffs stage.

VCT China saw an unexpected name take over the region during Kickoff.

All Gamersa team of VCT partners who had never qualified for a first-class world event, took the upper hand to secure the first regional ticket for the Masters Santiago.

To make this happen, All Gamers took down Nova Esports (2-0) and three of the four regional representatives in VALORANT Champions 2025, Bilibili Gaming (2-0), Dragon Ranger Gaming (2-1) and XLG Esports (3-2).

The Chinese organization brought this consecutive upset with a roster of inexperienced players, some of whom had never competed at the top tier of the VCT before.

Perhaps because of his more tier-one experience, Yang’Shr1mp‘ Yong has established himself as a key cornerstone of All Players’ success story. The Chinese player started competing in VALORANT esports in 2023 and made his VCT debut two years later under FunPlus Phoenix (FPX).

However, after only one tournament (VCT China Stage 1), Shr1mp made the switch to All Gamers for the entire 2025 season. Following the initial chaos of the first phase and the disappointing results in Phase 2, it now looks like all the pieces of the puzzle are in the right place for Sh1mp and this reshuffle of the All Players Program.

While still very fragile when needed, the resume expert has now found a program that can play to his success. However, some commentators have raised concerns about playing a big game that doesn’t work well for All Players, which could be used by more experienced international teams.

The VALORANT Masters Santiago Playoffs will reveal whether Shr1mp can unlock his full potential and strategy in his first world stage, or whether he and his team will be crushed by the opposition.

The VCT Americas third seed at Masters Santiago belongs to none other than the reigning VALORANT Tournament, NRG.

Heading to Kickoff 2026, the North American sports organization has made only one change to its list of winners: Signing Georgio’keiko‘Sanassy will replace Sam’s0m‘ Oh, who had retired to focus on content creation.

s0m was known for his delicate control and mental leadership, which means keiko has big shoes to fill in his new lineup. The British player previously represented EMEA’s Team Liquid, where he gained a reputation for his ability to break into the main control and secondary roles of the second roster.

In theory, this flexibility should make him the perfect s0m follower, given that the current meta favors dual duelist team composition. In practice, however, it has not been an easy transition, as shown by NRG’s route to Masters Santiago.

After defeating Cloud9 (2-0), the team fell to MIBR (1-2). Then, after defeating 100 Thieves (2-0), NRG lost to G2 Esports (0-2), before finally finding their place in the lower bracket. Furthermore, Keiko did not perform well in the VCT Americas Kickoff until the last game of the Lower Bracket Final against MIBR (3-2), showing that he has not yet fully warmed up to NRG’s lineup.

Considering the stacked bracket at Masters Santiago, keiko’s open power could make a big difference in NRG’s performance. But this only increases the pressure placed on the new member’s shoulders.

NRG’s first series in Santiago on February 28 against XLG Esports can give fans an idea of ​​what kind of keiko they can expect during his first world event with the reigning world champions.