Streamer and content creator Ibai “Ibai” Llanos announced his new VALORANT team, KOI, during a show match event on Wednesday against Karmine Corp. The event, organized with his partner Gerard Piqué, pitted Ibai’s League of Legends squad against Karmine Corp. and their new star AD carry, Martin “Rekkles” Larsson.
I was talking with some @KarmineCorp fan and things went crazy.
The event doesn’t start yet 🤯 pic.twitter.com/02iuhz1NjH
— Alejandro Gomis (@anonimotum) December 15, 2021
Ibai’s announcement came during the event, which took place in Barcelona, Spain, in front of a stadium crowd at Palau Sant Jordi. Ibai’s team is to enter another esport in VALORANT. Ibai confirmed that the name of this new team is KOI with the launch of its Twitter account, which drew more than 100,000 followers within minutes of the announcement. According to sources close to Upcomer, the team already has a naming sponsor in Finetwork.
Somos KOI #presentaciónKOI pic.twitter.com/tVhwr8HoUb
— KOI (@SquadKoi) December 15, 2021
KOIare currently undergoing tryouts with various players and, as of yet, no players have been decided. However, the staff is already set, with Antonio “Aska” Lozano and Sikako as coaches of the team.
Aska will take on the role of head coach. The Spaniard was previously coach of UCAM Esports Club in 2021. In turn, Sikako was also part of the Murcia team, so Ibai Llanos’ team seems to have hired UCAM’s staff as a pack.
The team’s presentation event, including the Koi VALORANT announcement and the show match between the Karmine Corp. and Ibai League of Legends squads, is still ongoing. Those teams will meet again on Jan. 8 in Paris to round out the show match agreement.
