Fnatic sends Paper Rex to VALORANT Champions 2025 lower bracket

Fnatic fans continue to celebrate at VALORANT Champions 2025 as the EMEA team defeated Pacific’s Paper Rex, while playing with a last-minute stand-in.

The second Upper Bracket Semifinal match today saw NRG win a VCT Americas derby against MIBR.

In a surprising turn of events, Fnatic had to face VCT Pacific Stage 2 champion Paper Rex (PRX) without its star sentinel player Emir ‘Alfajer’ Beder due to health complications. Against all odds, though, the EMEA team and stand-in Domagoj ‘Doma’ Fancev sent PRX to the lower bracket (2-1).

On PRX’s map pick, Bind, the Pacific squad already showed signs of struggle. Despite claiming two pistols and bonus round conversions, PRX barely came out on top to win the map 13-10.

In the first half, Fnatic made a recovery from being 0-4 down thanks to a dominant defence-side performance from Kajetan ‘kaajak’ Haremski. Doma’s aim and Tejo utility also looked impressive with Fnatic walking out ahead 7-5.

However, the EMEA team seemed more proactive on defence than during its slow attack defaults in the second half. Fnatic found little success with this passive approach. Meanwhile, PRX’s Khalish ‘d4v41’ Rusyaidee repeatedly punished Fnatic’s reluctant pushes via flanks and off-angles to claim the first map.

On Haven, PRX won its defence pistol round by hiding its fast A-flank with an Omen smoke on the enemy Killjoy turret. However, the Pacific squad couldn’t build an early lead. Instead, Fnatic set up an impressive economy of its own by winning a second-round thrifty. From thereon, kaajak went on another killing spree on Yoru. Ultimately, this resulted in an 8-5 first-half advantage to Fnatic.

With DRX now on the attack, Fnatic was rarely caught off guard by the aggressive plays from PRX’s Yoru/Waylay team composition. Moreover, in-game leader (IGL) Jake ‘Boaster’ Howlett intelligently abused PRX’s lack of information-gathering utility to identify gaps in the map. This frequently forced PRX to retake sites against the strong post-plant Viper comp, popularised by fellow Pacific team Gen.G.

After an 8-4 half, Fnatic secured its first pistol and bonus round to snowball its way to victory (13-4).

On the final map, Lotus, it was Fnatic’s turn to be put under intense pressure after its attack pistol win. Throughout the resulting snowball, PRX’s Jason ‘f0rsakeN’ Susanto reliably locked down A either with cheeky Omen plays or with Odin spams from ‘tree’.

Fnatic was denied throughout most of its attack side, losing nine consecutive until claiming the final two rounds of the half (3-9).

However, those two plays by Fnatic marked the beginning of another reality-bending comeback that will go down in VALORANT Champions history. In the second half, the team claimed the pistol and bonus rounds. Additionally, Fnatic may have prepared for PRX to exploit a seemingly weak C-site held by stand-in Doma. Whether anticipated or not, Fnatic successfully played retake on C while later shutting down PRX’s site hits on A and B.

Winning 12 rounds in a row, Fnatic secured Lotus 13-9.

The day continued with a VCT Americas derby between NRG and MIBR. Despite a record-breaking performance from MIBR’s star duelist Erick ‘aspas’ Santos, NRG took the series 2-1.

MIBR’s map pick, Abyss, saw incredibly close halves, although Abyss is one of the most attack-sided maps in VALORANT. NRG had a solid start on attack off the back of its only pistol round win in the series. However, MIBR bounced back once aspas came alive on his comfort agent, Jett, leaving the map in a good state for the Brazilian side in the second half (6-6).

In the second half, several back-and-forth rounds came down to individual aim duels as MIBR’s explosive site hits clashed with NRG’s methodical retakes. To add another layer to its attack plays, MIBR often deployed on-site smokes for aspas to dash into and play around.

Unfortunately for MIBR, such adjustments weren’t enough to deny overtime. On top of that, hero plays from NRG’s in-game leader (IGL) Ethan ‘Ethan’ Arnold and rookie duelist Adam ‘mada’ Pampuch led to an overtime victory for the team (16-14).

In a rare mirror match-up on Haven, MIBR taught a masterclass on how to play Gen.G’s Viper/Omen team composition. During the attack, Ethan’s mid-round calling was heavily tested, as the inexperienced IGL tends to rely on fast set strategies in times of uncertainty. As these were shut down all across the map, Ethan had to default plays versus MIBR.

However, attack defaulting was never NRG’s strength, and the team struggled to take map control and pinpoint the enemy’s Killjoy setup. Meanwhile, MIBR’s Killjoy turret often held C-long and garage all by itself in typical Gen.G fashion. MIBR concluded the half 10-2, and secured both pistol rounds to even out the match score (13-4).

The final showdown took place on Corrode, where the solo-Waylay comps of both teams had strong attack sides. First, MIBR won five attack rounds on the typically defence-sided map. Its versatile pacing and on-the-fly micro-adjustments allowed the team to take full advantage of aspas’ Waylay.

In the second half, though, MIBR was thriftied after its fifth pistol round win of the series. This thrifty shifted the momentum of the game entirely. NRG delivered its own convincing site executes, while MIBR’s rookies seemed to crumble under the ever-rising pressure.

With MIBR’s backs against the wall, IGL Andrew ‘Verno’ Maust rose to the occasion. He first stopped the enemy’s win streak with an impactful Sova ultimate, and then forced overtime by denying a last-minute plant. However, these efforts, as well as an overtime ACE from aspas were ultimately not enough versus NRG’s resilience (14-16).

Throughout every map of the series, MIBR’s aspas was the highest-fragging player on the server. With a kill-death ratio (KDA) of 80/42/6, the veteran broke the record for the most kills at a VCT global event.

Following today’s victories, Fnatic and NRG have advanced to the Upper Bracket Final at VALORANT Champions 2025, which will take place on October 3rd in Paris’ Accor Arena.

On the other hand, Paper Rex and MIBR must fight for survival in the lower bracket tomorrow. Kicking off at 2 PM BST, Paper Rex will play against EMEA’s Team Heretics. Afterwards, MIBR and Pacific’s DRX will take the stage.

Fans can tune into tomorrow’s elimination games via VCT’s official YouTube and Twitch channels.