Luis Guadalupe “DarkAngel” Castillo Gomez Becomes the FATAL FURY:
City of the Wolves Champion At Esports World Cup 2026
The first Esports World Cup 2026 trophy has been awarded to Luis
Guadalupe “DarkAngel” Castillo Gomez following a dominant final
against Kenta “mi2ha4” Ichihara, earning the first major Club
Championship points haul of the competition for NAVI.
Media Lobby [1]
PARIS, France (July 11, 2026) — Luis Guadalupe “DarkAngel” Castillo
Gomez has won the FATAL FURY: City of the Wolves tournament at Esports
World Cup [2] 2026 after taking down Virtus.Pro’s Kenta “mi2ha4”
Ichihara 4-1 in the grand final. The NAVI player fought through a tough
finals bracket to make it to the end, and triumphed in an electrifying
finale that went heavily in his favour.
DarkAngel, who was the only player from last year’s top eight to make it
to this year’s finals bracket, improved on his third-place finish by
taking the top spot, but the Mexican player’s journey was filled with
top level opposition on his way.
The newly crowned champion came back from 3-0 down in his quarterfinal
match against Elite Esports’ Reynald Tacsuan to tie things up at 3-3,
and then again at 4-4, before taking the final game. He then took a
narrow 4-3 win over Japan’s Naoki “Nemo” Nemoto to book his place in the
final.
This win marks the first major FATAL FURY: City of the Wolves tournament
win for DarkAngel, after narrowly missing out at DreamHack Birmingham
earlier this year and his third place finish at EWC 2025. However, with
the two players who outplaced him last year, Goichi “GO1” Kishida and
Zeng “Xiao Hai” Zhuojun, out of the competition early, the stage was set
for DarkAngel to make his run at the trophy.
The NAVI player was able to turn the competition on its head with an
aggressive playstyle using Terry Bogard, and he proved to be simply
unbeatable in the later stages of the competition, finally taking the
last step at a major tournament and lifting a major trophy for the first
time.
“I’m extremely happy and extremely grateful, thank you for my team NAVI,
and everyone in Latin America that follows me and supports me,” Luis
Guadalupe “DarkAngel” Castillo Gomez said following his triumph.
“I’ve learned a lot through every single person who has played with me,
from the wins, from the losses. Thank you to everyone who has ever
helped me, even though you are not in my team specifically, I have
always learned from them, and I’m extremely grateful.”
Runner-up mi2ha4, looked strong on his way to the grand final, but was
unable to overcome DarkAngel, marking the second major tournament this
year where he has fallen at the final hurdle, following EVO 2026. A
small consolation for mi2ha4 is that he finally triumphed over fellow
countryman Laggia, ending his unbeaten streak in the tournament, and
taking the semi-final win over a player he had never been able to beat
throughout their competitive history.
Prior to the final, Laggia and Nemo competed in the third-place match,
with both Japanese players trading rounds and giving it their all. With
an extra $20,000 between third and fourth place, along with a difference
of 200 club championship points, there was still everything to play for.
Nemo took the victory 5-2, and secured 500 Club Championship points for
Saishunkan Sol Kumamoto.
While 2025 champion Goichi “GO1” Kishida was highly tipped to take the
top spot, he withdrew from the tournament due to health issues. Then
last year’s runner-up Zeng “Xiao Hai” Zhuojun also failed to make it
into the top 16, falling to Team Vitality’s Konstantinos “K-TOP” Lamprou
in a closely contested Mr. Karate mirror match in the first group stage,
which left the finals bracket wide open for newcomers and unlikely
underdogs.
The grand finals victory gives DarkAngel $250,000 of the $1 million
prize pool, automatic qualification to the SNK World Championship 2026
finals, and 1,000 Club Championship points for NAVI, who head to the top
end of the table. With first-place, DarkAngel has singlehandedly
improved on NAVI’s Club Championship points from last year, taking them
up to 1,000 points compared to last year’s 900, with plenty of
competition to come. mi2ha4, meanwhile, earns 750 points for Virtus.Pro,
putting his club in good standing for this year’s competition.
To learn more about the Esports World Cup, visit esportsworldcup.com [3]
and follow the Esports Foundation on LinkedIn [4].
