Riot Games Cancels VALORANT Challengers CIS: Milestone for 2023 VCT Season
The VALORANT Challengers League for the CIS region, known as Challengers CIS: Milestone, will not resume in the 2023 VCT season after careful consideration by the EMEA Challengers League officials, as announced by Riot Games today.
Milestone, which was part of the EMEA regional leagues in 2022, was canceled last March due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This league consisted of eight teams mostly composed of Russian players.
After only two weeks of competition, matches were postponed in early March and eventually the entire league was canceled for the majority of the year. The invasion’s timing also caused delays in the top tier of EMEA VALORANT competition, leading to the postponement of EMEA Challengers One group stage matches and the former Gambit roster having to compete as Masters 3 Champions (M3C) for the rest of the year.
Challengers CIS would have allowed players from Russia, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan to participate in the league. Although it is disappointing for them not to have their own league, Riot has permitted these players to continue competing as EMEA residents in VCT and Challengers.
This means that these players can potentially join any team in any EMEA Challengers region. Teams only need at least three players from a specific territory and can add players from the EMEA resident pool to complete their rosters. The EMEA rulebook no longer includes the CIS league or territories in its glossary, but the countries that comprised the CIS territory are still mentioned in the EMEA competitive region list.
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