After more than two years,
GIANTX
GIANTX
Europe
Unranked
purp0
Semyon Borchev
Cloud
Kirill Nehozhin
runneR
Emil Trajkovski
westside
Miłosz Duda
tomaszy
Tomás Machado
have parted ways with Žygimantas "nukkye"
Chmieliauskas. Now a free agent, he is currently looking for offers.
nukkye has been a mainstay at the top of European Valorant since 2020. His resumé includes winning First Strike and reaching the 2021 regional Masters grand final with
Team Heretics
Team Heretics
Europe
Unranked
MiniBoo
Dominykas Lukaševičius
Wo0t
Mert Alkan
RieNs
Enes Ecirli
benjyfishy
Benjamin David Fish
Boo
Ričardas Lukaševičius
. He next played for
G2 Esports
G2 Esports
Inactive
. There, he represented EMEA in two different Masters events, becoming the first Lithuanian player to attend an international tournament. In 2023, with G2's exclusion from the VCT partnerships, nukkye was picked up by
Giants Gaming
Giants Gaming
Inactive
Redgar
Igor Vlasov
Fit1nho
Adolfo Gallego
nukkye
Žygimantas Chmieliauskas
hoody
Aaro Peltokangas
Cloud
Kirill Nehozhin
, now GIANTX.
The team was unsuccessful at LOCK//IN, but showed a better performance in the EMEA League. Their improvement was not enough to qualify to Masters Tokyo, as they only reached the top six before being eliminated from contention. Giants next won the EMEA LCQ, earning a spot in Champions. In both EMEA tournaments, nukkye was one of the better players in the region, finishing with the sixth and third highest ratings, respectively.
Unfortunately, the team went out in the group stage at Champions, only taking a series from KRÜ Esports. Their in-game leader, rhyme, retired soon afterwards. GIANTX were able to win the only off-season event they participated in, with nukkye once again featuring towards the top in terms of statistics.
The first event of 2024, Kickoff, was a disappointment. GIANTX went out in the group stage after 2-1 losses to FUT Esports and the eventual winners, Karmine Corp. This was the third time in nukkye's career that his team failed to make it out of groups, and the first time he had back-to-back exits from a tournament without progressing past the opening stage. He remained the second best performer of the team, but his 1.00 rating only put him towards the middle of the pack, overall.
As reported by Alejandro Gomis, nukkye's replacement is expected to be Semyon "purp0"
Borchev. The Russian flex was recently released from
KPI Gaming
KPI Gaming
Europe
Unranked
zeddy
Nikolai Lapko
l0udly
Marius Žilinskas
pyrolll
Artur Minin
7ssk7
Artur Kurshin
basya
Branislav Koritca
, currently the best team in Challengers Spain with a 13-1 record in the regular season.
GIANTX
GIANTX
Europe
Unranked
purp0
Semyon Borchev
Cloud
Kirill Nehozhin
runneR
Emil Trajkovski
westside
Miłosz Duda
tomaszy
Tomás Machado
will next play a rematch against
Karmine Corp
Karmine Corp
Europe
Unranked
saadhak
Matias Delipetro
Avez
Hazem Khaled
Elite
Efe Teber
SUYGETSU
Dmitry Ilyushin
marteen
Martin Pátek
: