Bryan ‘pANcada’ Luna confirmed on a live stream that he is not starting for Sentinels at VCT Americas Kickoff tournament to the shock of Valorant fans.
The start of the VCT 2024 season is on the horizon as all four leagues are gearing up for their Kickoff tournaments. The VCT season was a long time coming as the off-season was months long and featured only a few top-tier events.
Sentinels were one of the teams to host and appear in multiple off-season events after finalizing its roster, bringing in Mouhamed ‘johnqt’ Ouarid as an IGL and Jordan ‘Zellsis’ Montemurro as a substitute.
During those events, Sentinels player pANcada was largely absent and only played in a few matches, with Zellsis taking over the starting role at the AfreecaTV Valorant League. The team has not put forward an official announcement of his benching, however, the team and pANcada have so far acted like Zellsis has claimed a starting role on the Valorant team.
Valorant fans were shocked to see pANcada talk so openly about the situation. The Brazilian confirmed on a live stream that he won’t play at the VCT Americas Kickoff tournament.
pANcada and Sentinels potentially breakup
pANcada was asked in a live stream if he was looking forward to playing at the event later this February, and the player revealed he was in Brazil, according to a report from ValorantZone.
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“(Eager) for what? I won’t play,” he said.
Fans of the team were shocked by the news, with some lashing out at the organization over the revelation.
“Pick up the champion smokes player from LOUD. Force him to learn a new language. Force change his role from smokes to sentinel. Remove him from the main roster over bad results on Sentinel. W MANAGEMENT?” One fan said.
>pick up the champion smokes player from LOUD>force him to learn a new language>force change his role from smokes to sentinel>remove him from the main roster over bad results on sentinelW MANAGEMENT? https://t.co/dAsncOJ0cY
— Rocket (@RocketBullets) February 9, 2024
While Sentinels have not put out any official communication about pANcada’s status with the roster, the team has done interviews insinuating Zellsis is sticking around and have not mentioned the Brazilian world champion in the lead-up to the Kickoff event.
pANcada is still contracted to Sentinels through 2024 and might have to wait for later in the season for a transfer to another squad for a shot at playing professionally this year.
