Former Fnatic coach Jacob ‘mini’ Harris and Team Liquid content creator Connor ‘Sliggy’ Blomfield hosted a showmatch to celebrate the fifth anniversary of Valorant.
The event, called Semidecade Slugfest, was broadcast on Fnatic streamer Megan “megsoundslikeegg” Garner’s Twitch channel on Monday night.
Valorant was released on June 2nd, 2020, and both mini and Sliggy are prominent figures in the game’s esports community.
British Valorant professional, mini, recently retired from coaching after working with Fnatic from 2021 to 2024. During that time he contributed to the team’s victories in Sao Paulo and Tokyo in 2023.
The VCT EMEA’s coach of the year for 2023 has been co-streaming, VOD-reviewing and casting Valorant esports matches this year.
Meanwhile, fellow Brit Sliggy spent two years coaching Team Liquid’s Valorant rosters before moving into a content creation role within the esports organisation.
Team mini defeats Team Sliggy in Valorant anniversary match
Team mini beat Team Sliggy in the Semidecade Slugest Valorant anniversary showmatch on Monday evening.
Mini’s squad consisted of Valorant creators Acrethedog and Thinking Man’s Valorant as well as esports commentators Josh ‘Sideshow’ Wilkinson and Mitch ‘MitchMan’ McBride.
Sliggy was joined by Valorant coaching brothers Emil ‘eMIL’ Sandgren and Erik ‘d00mbr0s’ Sandgren, as well as streamer Karagii and Liquid Academy Head Coach Jake ‘Bacon9’ Lloyd.
The two teams faced each other across five maps, with Team mini ultimately winning the showcase match 4-1.
Team Sliggy prevented a five-match sweep by winning the final map.
After the match, mini joked on Twitch: “Easy for us, was fully expected. I had no doubts in my mind we had to troll at the end just to give them something to care about.”
In response, Sliggy playfully claimed, “The main thing was that it was winner-takes-all on the last map, so we basically won the whole thing.”
Valorant’s five-year anniversary
The showcase match between Team mini and Team Sliggy comes as Valorant celebrates its five-year anniversary.
Valorant will celebrate its anniversary with events across the UK, including in London, Durham, Manchester and Warwick.
Riot Games has also announced some in-game changes, recently showcasing the highly anticipated replay system for the first time.
The Unreal Engine 5 upgrade is also set to go live around the end of July. Riot has also announced there will be changes for Valorant’s esports scene in 2027 to bridge the gap between Tier 1 and Tier 2 teams.
Kieran Lynch is an esports journalist who writes about several games including EA Sports FC 25, Call of Duty, Rainbox Six Siege, and more. He previously worked as a sports journalist for MailOnline.
