After VALORANT Champions 2023 got off to a smooth start with no major problems, the final VCT event of the year, appropriately, experienced another positive COVID test just as the second day of the playoffs was about to start.
An official announcement from the VALORANT esports team today confirmed that a member of the DRX roster has produced a positive test for COVID after self-requesting the test. Since the player in question feels well enough to play, they will compete against Bilibili today on LAN from an isolated room in a quarantined area, away from his teammates. DRX came out on stage without Kim “MaKo” Myeong-kwan, indicating he was the player who tested positive.
DRX brought a sixth player with them and won both of their group-stage matches with Zest in the starting lineup while Foxy9 stayed on the bench. Theoretically, DRX could have swapped in Foxy9 for the player for MaKo, but the team has opted to play with one of the world’s best controller players while he competes from quarantine.
With this positive test, Champions 2023 joins the list of international VALORANT events that have seen at least one player test positive for COVID. Champions was originally on pace to become the second-straight event without a positive test after Masters Tokyo. Earlier this year, Fnatic were forced to compete with superstar Derke quarantined for their opening match against Sentinels at LOCK//IN, but the Finnish star was able to return to the stage in time for them to win the event.
The announcement noted that the schedule is subject to change, but DRX are currently scheduled to play against Bilibili today at 2pm CT.