A COVID-19 scare at VALORANT Champions this morning nearly derailed the event, but the rapid antigen tests ended up being false.
Riot has announced that all the players who tested positive for COVID-19 at Valorant Champions earlier this morning have now tested negative and have been cleared to play in the tournament.
This comes after Team Liquid's Nabil “Nivera” Benrlitom tested positive for the virus the day before the tournament began and Team Envy's Victor “Victor” Wong also tested positive the very next day. Safety measures were immediately taken and both of those teams were quarantined.
Earlier this morning, there were reports of a potential outbreak as multiple players were to have also tested positive, causing an understandable panic according to Upcomer reporter George Geddes.
After postponing the game for an hour and initiating safety measures that included a backup LAN server at the hotel, a new schedule was provided, with Gambit and Team Vikings playing first and Sentinels and Team Liquid playing second. The tests that were initially used on the players are known as rapid antigen tests, which are much quicker, yet less accurate in determining whether someone has a respiratory illness such as COVID-19. Players that tested positive were quickly PCR tested to double-check the rapid test results.
The more accurate test is the PCR, or the Polymerase Chain Reaction tests, which can take as little as 12 hours or as much as five days to provide a result. The latter's results came back earlier today, with all players tested coming back negative.
Also included in the delay was the push back on the match between Acend and Team Envy, who are awaiting deliberations on the ruling made last night against Vivo Keyd.
The tournament resumed at 7:00am PST, but with noticeable differences including post-interview matches showing talent and players maintaining more of a distance from each other in order to prevent potential transmission.