Senzu to miss IEM Rio 2026

Passion UA have announced that Senzu will not be attending the upcoming IEM Rio 2026 event due to 'ESL regulations' and FaNg will stand-in for the Mongolian rifler at the event. Passion UA had received an invite to IEM Rio due to their standings in the VRS and received the invite as a North Americas team but switched players post the invite date. They will need to comply with ESL's new regional changes and need to have a roster with 'plurality of players from the region' which means following Passion UA parting ways with Grim, they needed to field a North American which gives them an Americas core to keep their invite for the event.

With FaNg joining the team for IEM Rio 2026, he will be the third Americas player in the team along with nicx and try. FaNg will also once again join the server with his former Complexity teammates, JT and coach T.c. FaNg has been inactive following his recent stint with BOSS and has played for NRG, Getting Info and Party Astronauts most recently.

Senzu, following his departure from The MongolZ, made his debut for Passion UA at the ESL Pro League Season 23 Stage 1. Senzu and co. beat Liquid in their opening game before going down to FUT, paiN and HEROIC to exit in 12-14th place. The suffered an opening match exit in the Stake Ranked Episode 1 Closed Qualifier and suffered back-to-back losses at the BC Game Masters Championship Season 1 where they finished in 21-24th place. The results have been disappointing for Senzu with his new team but the Mongolian has been one of the highest rated players for Passion UA since joining them. Senzu will be next seen in action at the Urban Riga Open Season 4 LAN in Latvia where they are scheduled to play PURE in their Group A opener.

IEM Rio 2026 will take place in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil between April 13th - April 19th, 2026 with 16 teams battling it out for the $1,000,000 prize pool. Amongst the teams who will be in attendance in Brazil will be Vitality, Natus Vincere (NAVI), Falcons, Liquid, FURIA, G2 and Spirit amongst others.

With FaNg filling in for Senzu, the Passion UA roster at IEM Rio 2026 will be:

• JT

• try

• nicx

• Kvem

• FaNg

• T.c (coach)