Team Liquid has signed former Team Vitality player Nikita ‘trexx’ Cherednichenko ahead of VCT EMEA Stage 2.
The new roster member will replace Maikls ‘Serial’ Ždanovs, whose departure from the European esports organisation was announced on July 11th.
Team Liquid has undergone a somewhat turbulent season in the 2025 VALORANT Champions Tour (VCT) so far. In EMEA Kickoff and Stage 1, the squad qualified for the first two international tournaments of the year, Masters Bangkok and Toronto. However, Team Liquid could not make it past the Group Stage at either event.
The team has also undergone several roster changes since the beginning of the year, including the departure of Maks ‘kamyk’ Rychlewski and, most recently, Serial. Team Liquid’s run at Masters Toronto, in particular, was impacted by the delayed arrival of in-game leader (IGL) Ayaz ‘nAts’ Akhmetshin. Due to nAts’ Visa issues, the team was forced to play its opening match with a last-minute stand-in, Erik ‘penny’ Penny.
At VCT EMEA Stage 2, Team Liquid now hopes to qualify for the season-ending VALORANT Champions tournament in September. The new roster will debut on July 17th at 7 pm BST in a best-of-three (BO3) series against KOI.
Thanks to its repeated Masters qualification, the team is in a good position to secure a Champions 2025 slot. VCT teams may advance to Champions by earning Points for regional achievements, with Liquid currently placed third on the EMEA Points leaderboard.
Who is Team Liquid’s New Player?
Since the beginning of his professional VALORANT career in 2020, trexx has competed for various notable organisations such as OG, Guild Esports and KOI. In January last year, the Russian player joined Europe-based organisation Team Vitality, with which he attended Champions 2024.
Following the signing of star player Nikita ‘Derke’ Sirmitev, Team Vitality looked like a dominant force at VCT Kickoff, but only reached fourth place at Masters Bangkok. Trexx was then benched ahead of VCT Stage 1 in March.
However, the player made waves in the EMEA VALORANT community with a social media post seemingly commenting on Team Vitality’s inability to make Masters Toronto. In the aftermath, trexx faced public criticism from his former teammate Derke regarding his professional attitude, which trexx denied in his response.
In a video interview for Team Liquid, trexx commented on his goals for the remainder of the season: “I’m excited to come back, to be honest. It’s been a long three months. I just want to qual for Champs and prove everyone wrong, I guess.”
