One of the largest eSports organizations in the world has lifted lifetime ban on some teams who were accused of cheating and match fixing. The ban was imposed by Valve and were followed by every major tournament organizer. However, ESL is the first organizer who backtracked on the bans.
One of the teams that was affected by the bans is iBUYPOWER, who were caught match fixing back in 2015. The team included the then top rated CS: GO players in the field. The lifting of the ban was done after a survey from eSports Integrity Coalition.
The controversial decision was followed by a major outcry from the CS: GO community as a whole. The main concern from the community was that the lifting of the ban was unfair. The other side of the argument was that the players were not warned of the consequences prior to the act and that they were not given a warning first.
The bans on the teams are set to expire on August 1. “Our reasoning here is that, whilst the players are clearly culpable and should have known better, the rules surrounding this sort of activity were not clear at the time, no education had been provided to the players and the procedures used to sanction them were not transparent and did not comply with principles of natural justice”, they said.
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