The Street Fighter 6 community was holding its collective breath during a recent showmatch at Evo. The Legends LIVE showmatch featured veteran Daigo Umehara and Saul Leonardo “MenaRD” Mena II competing in an intense first-to-10.
Daigo has been the GOAT of the game for quite some time. Now in his mid-40s, he has been competing at a top level in Street Fighter since 1991, back with Street Fighter II. Many wanted him to come out of the fight victorious, to show he still had what it takes to be the best. However, MenaRD is at the top of his game and his a Street Fighter 6 champion.
In the end, MenaRD won 10-6, slaying the Beast. The matches were close, but MenaRD had a better handle on the latest iteration of the game and was adapting to everything Daigo threw at him. Daigo has not been super dominant in Street Fighter 6, so it wasn’t all that shocking. But many felt this didn’t take away his GOAT title at all. Six wins against the current best, while nowhere near his prime, seemed like a huge W.
Daigo Reacts to Loss: It’s Not Over
On April 30th, Daigo opened up about the importance of the showmatch. Leading up to the event, Daigo told himself he “absolutely cannot lose.” He even considered retiring if he was unable to beat MenaRD. He said he’d gone into the tournament with this mindset: “If I lose, I will retire from competitive gaming.” He felt the motivation he had when he was younger just wasn’t there anymore.
However, the defeat awoke that hunger. Daigo will not be retiring. In fact, losing to MenaRD “ignited a fire” inside of him. The months before the showmatch he had been training hard, and he wants to keep doing that to see where it will take him.
Daigo will unfortunately not be competing at Evo Japan. However, he is feeling “extremely positive” about what’s to come after that.