The year 2021 is coming to an end. The world of CS has witnessed a lot of events over this period: LANs are back, Valve finally held a Major, NAVI finally won it. And of course, some tournaments saw scandals — that’s exactly what the CS.MONEY Blog is going to cover today.
A controversial rematch at a Europe-based RMR event
In May, Flashpoint held a European RMR tournament. One of the matches saw Ninjas in Pyjamas, who had just purchased device, go head-to-head with the Polish team Anonymo. While NiP were the favorite (small wonder), the encounter developed in a rather unexpected way. The Polish squad won — but the most interesting stuff began after the match.
First, the Swedes complained about the conditions of the match: they claimed to have suffered a loss of 40% on the last map.
“We lose to anonymo, very shitty conditions and I must state my absolute . . . disappointment with faceits amateur handling of the situation,” commented Device.
After the organizers investigated and reviewed the evidence provided by NIP — video footage — they scheduled a rematch. This caused a wave of resentment in the community.
The Poles declared they were under pressure from NIP and Flashpoint. In particular, they were informed about the rematch less than 24 hours before its start.
“We are currently getting pressured from both Ninjas in Pyjamas and the organisers of Flashpoint to replay the match . . . At the first timeout . . . we’ve offered to reschedule it as soon as we’ve heard about the technical problems of NiP – they [Flashpoint] did not choose to do it.
We are very emotional about the situation – we know that something like that would not happen in any other sport and esport tournament. We wanted to do everything in the competitive spirit of fair play. NiP does not seem to care about that at all.”
In any event, the rematch did take place — the community’s resentment cut no ice. NIP won the new match, exacerbating the anger of the Swedish team and those who sympathized with them in this situation. FACEIT just hushed the entire matter up.
Cheats at a CIS-based RMR tournament?
May was a really scandal-packed period in CS:GO. The European RMR tournament was followed by a CIS-based event that featured the little-known Ukrainian team Akuma, who had entered it through an open qualifier.
At the event, Akuma defeated K23 as well as decimated Virtus.pro and NAVI. The community, including pro players, had doubts about the integrity of Akuma’s players. An obscure team beating the best clubs in the region is weird indeed.
These doubts were reinforced by certain moments from the matches. On multiple occasions, Akuma’s players made strange maneuvers and looked towards the radar when they didn’t really need to. A theory emerged that they were using a so-called radar hack.
“It’s so obvious to anyone who understands CS that it’s kind of disgusting that this kind of shit is happening yet again at a CIS-based RMR event.
You’ll remember that story with Zoner, and now this. One thing is intriguing: how EEE, and Valve in particular, are going to investigate it all,” seized said.
The team’s checkered past surfaced as well: some players were banned by bookmakers for participating in suspicious matches.
Of course, the players denied everything, and the tournament organizers’ inspection revealed nothing forbidden. ESIC launched an investigation of its own — but they failed to unearth any evidence against Akuma’s players.
Akuma wasn’t banned for lack of legal basis; clips aren’t proof, after all. The team also played in the next RMR tournament, where they didn’t win once in five matches. This kind of performance convinced many people anew that their accusations are true, while others, on the contrary, wrote them off as the first time that a famous team was too poorly prepared for an encounter with a little-known club.
HUNDEN versus Heroic
This scandal happened right before IEM Cologne 2021. Heroic announced, quite out of the blue, that they would be flying to Cologne without their coach Nicolai “HUNDEN” Petersen. The reason wasn’t given immediately, and many might’ve thought it was due to an illness or personal circumstances, as is usually the case. But the story was much more interesting, as it turned out.
Soon enough, HUNDEN shed light on the situation, saying he wouldn’t prolong his contract with Heroic as he was accused of passing on the Danes’ stratbook to another team.
Heroic’s reaction was immediate: the contract with Nicolai was terminated and he was sued. ESIC launched an investigation too, and its result hardly pleased HUNDEN: he was banned for two years. In fact, it’s the end of his career as a coach. Recently, Nicolai posted a photo showing how he’s mastering the profession of a bartender.
