The Esports Integrity Commission has banned another 35 Australian CS:GO players over betting offences dating back to 2019. It brings the total number of bans up to 42 after seven others were banned in October 2020.
ESIC’s investigation into match fixing and adverse betting is currently ongoing. However, the Commission has handed down their latest judgment, banning 35 Australian CS:GO players from their partnered events.
The bans vary from 12 months up to five years, and will start from January 22, 2021. All suspended players have also been referred to Australian police.
“Over the past few years, ESIC has been investigating instances of betting behaviour violations and suspected match manipulation on a global scale. While this problem is not unique to ESEA events, the scope of this release will be to explore the result of investigations into such behaviour in Australian CS:GO,” they said on January 22.
Today, we are issuing sanctions against players found in violation of the ESIC code.
— ESEA (@ESEA) January 22, 2021
We are committed to preserving the integrity of our competitions and providing a fair playground for professional players. https://t.co/tAs0LEQHZa
The wave has caught numerous Tier 1 and Tier 2 Australian CS:GO players, including ex-Ground Zero’s Andy “Noobster” Zhang, Vertex’s James “roflko” Lytras, and now-coach of ORDER Wilson “willyks” Sugianto (formerly of Vertex).
Aftermind, Integral Nation, Lese, Control, Overt, and R!OT Gaming are also just some of over a dozen teams with players banned.
The judgment also handed down extended bans to Akram “adk” Smida and Daryl “Mayker” May, who were also caught under ESIC’s Anti-Corruption Code back in October 2020. They will be banned from ESIC-partner events for 24 and 48 months respectively.
ESIC’s investigations are not exclusive to Australian players. They are also looking into “a number of other CS:GO leagues including leagues located in North America, Europe and a significant number of other leagues in multiple game titles.”
You can find the full list of banned players below:
- Jeremy “motion” Lloyd (Control) — 12 months
- Patrick “falcon” Romano De Sousa (Control) — 12 months
- Johnathan “Del” Sackesen (Lese) — 12 months
- Grayson “vax” Uppington (Overt) — 12 months
- Aidan “meta” Wiringi Jones (Overt) — 12 months
- Kaito “minusthecoffee” Massey (Aftermind) — 12 months
- Mason “msn” Trevaskis (Aftermind) — 12 months
- John “jcg” Grima (Integral Nation) — 12 months
- Isaac “prodigy” Dahlan (Integral Nation) — 12 months
- Billy “beetee” Thomson (Integral Nation) — 12 months
- Kieren “Muzoona” Jackson-Clapper (Integral Nation) — 12 months
- Matthew “zilla” Zdilar (Mako) — 12 months
- James “roflko” Lytras (Vertex) — 12 months
- Damon “damyo” Portelli (LAKERS) — 12 months
- Jak “jtr” Robinson (Rooster 2) — 12 months
- Daniel “rekonz” Mort (R!OT Gaming) — 12 months
- Nicolas “lato” Gullotti (Skyfire) — 12 months
- Marcus “mdk” Kyriazopoulos (really weird) — 12 months
- Joel “pearss” Kurta (Waterbottle, Valorant) — 12 months
- James “jamie” MacPhail (Downfall) — 12 months
- Ioan (Ionica) “bowie” Tuleasca (Lese) — 12 months
- Joshua “joshaaye” Wilson — 12 months
- Ryan “kragz” Clarke (Incept) — 12 months
- Roman “matr1kz” Santos (Forbidden) — 24 months
- Cailan “caily” Lovegrove (Aftermind) — 24 months
- Andy “Noobster” Zhang (Ground Zero) — 36 months
- Jayden “foggers” Graham (Control) — 48 months
- Sam “tham” Mitchell (Buckets) — 48 months
- Mate “habbo hotel” Poduje (LAKERS) — 48 months
- Samuel “samy” Jarvis (Caught off Guard) — 48 months
- Daniel “deezy” Zhang (Aftermind) — 48 months
- John “wots” Zhu (Forbidden) — 48 months
- Matthew “jam” Castro (Overt) — 60 months
- Alvin “Gravins” Changgra — 60 months
- Wilson “willyks” Sugianto (Vertex) — 60 months
“ESIC closely monitors betting activity in esports for the purpose of protecting the industry against bad actors who wish to exploit the industry for personal gain. Accordingly, it is important that professional players understand that breaches of ESIC’s Anti-Corruption Code are a serious concern,” ESIC concluded their statement with.
“It is crucially important that professional players abstain from placing bets on the game from which they earn an income in order to preserve the integrity of the esports landscape internationally and mitigate the potential for bad actors to take advantage of our sport.”
The players have a right to appeal the sentence through mechanisms outlined by ESIC privately.
