Danish Counter-Strike organization Astralis has been under fire after it was revealed that br0 was substituted from the team ahead of the BLAST Fall Final under false pretenses which led to ESIC opening an investigation.
Following, Casper ‘cadiaN’ Moller getting benched from Liquid, Astralis swooped in to steer their ship in the right direction. His signing would take the leadership duties off dev1ce who would assume his role as a dedicated AWPer again.
Astralis completed cadiaN transfer right ahead of the Blast Fall Finals and had no time to alter the registered roster. br0, who was getting replaced by cadiaN was removed when Astralis cited a medical emergency which wasn’t the case. This manoeuvre allowed the Danish org to field cadiaN in the tournament which eventually led to ESIC stepping in to conduct an investigation.
In the ruling passed by ESIC, Astralis has been found guilty of presenting false information to a tournament organizer for which they must pay a fine of $15,000 and at the same time forfeit the $10,000 prize money they received.
Astralis acknowledged the ruling and along with complying with it, they further announced that they will donate $15,000 to the Danish Mental Health Foundation (Psykiatrifonden).
Along with Astralis, ESIC grilled BLAST for not confirming the information presented by teams in situations like this. Moving forward, tournament organizers are advised to conduct their investigation to avoid a similar mishap.
