Hello, I figured I would write down my preliminary thoughts on each of the franchised teams after watching them at LOCK//IN. The full list was too long for a single post, so here are the EMEA teams.
EMEA:
FNATIC: I picked them to win LOCK//IN, and they did not disappoint. I called this team the greatest superteam EMEA has ever seen, and I still hold by that. FNATIC were always good despite very underwhelming player quality in the past. Finally this team has elite firepower to complement their consistently superb tactics and IGLing.
NAVI: cNed was a big upgrade, and ANGE1 is one of the best IGLs in Valorant. I never understood the suygetsu top 20 player in the world talk, but if a player as good as him is the weakest link (outside of the IGL), then you have yourselves an elite team.
Giants: nukkye and Cloud is one of the best duos in the world, and the rest of the team are all capable of top fragging vs any team. I don't quite trust fit1nho as a star, but the biggest concern is rhymes IGLing. It has looked good, but to win tournaments in an era of superteams requires that extra step that I haven't seen yet.
KOI: trexx and sheydos is a good core, but I've never been a huge fan of Koldamenta led teams. Wolfen ran into a wall at LOCK//IN, but if he can become a star, this team has some potential. Overall, this team screams upset threat without high end punch.
TL: Uhh... that was awful. Sayf will rebound, but this team has more name value than potential imo. I wasn't a huge fan of this roster before the event, and their complete lack of cohesion or comfortability makes me question them more. They will get better, but I am worried about how far they can go.
FUT: I said this roster was pretty heavily underrated, and I was impressed with them at this event. That being said, the ceiling on this team isn't super high unless AtaKaptan develops into a star. Similarly to EG, good but not great across the board.
BBL: I don't think this team has much potential. Picking up a low fragging IGL because you realized your young star was too young to play by rule is indicative of the holes in this team. Maybe SouhcNi was the right call, but in that case, this team needs more firepower around him.
VIT: This team is still too heavily reliant on Twisten and Molsi, but overall, this is a good team. In a similar boat as KOI, this team feels like it has a fighting chance as is with a good possibility of improvement. They are definitely still at least one roster move away from true contention though.
KCorp: This roster is still a bit of a mess. If SHIN can continue to rise, this team has decent firepower, but xms has not looked the same away from Chamber. ScreaM's IGLing is the biggest problem. They ran a TON of slow defaults that went nowhere and failed to get FPX/LOUD to rotate improperly.
TH: There aren't that many rosters in franchising that I think are going nowhere, but this is definitely one of them. This team has a lot of players that would be 3rd-5th options on good teams, and although some players can pop off, consistency is not a term used to describe their stars.
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