A CS:GO team is currently facing heavy criticism from fans for hiring a former coach who was banned for cheating.
Which team is it?
- The Danish esports organization Astralis is one of the best-known teams in digital sports and is active in games like CS:GO, Valorant, and Rainbow Six: Siege.
- Between 2016 and 2019, Astralis won high-profile titles, including the “StarLadder Major 2019” in Berlin and the “Intel Extreme Masters XIII – Katowice Major 2019”
- In CS:GO, they have star players like Nicolai “dev1ce” Reedtz in their ranks.
- Former players include Peter “dupreeh” Rasmussen and Finn “karrigan” Andersen
Who has Astralis signed? On January 5, Astralis announced that they had hired former player and coach Nicolai “HUNDEN” Petersen as the “Head Analyst”. The 31-year-old Dane was involved in two scandals in his career as a CS:GO coach, for which he was banned.
Coach exploited bug for unfair advantage
Why was he banned the first time? In 2020, the so-called “Spectator Bug” caused a stir in the CS:GO community. The bug created a type of “Free Camera” perspective.
Some coaches deliberately triggered the bug by executing certain steps and then exploited it to gain insight into the movements of opponents that they shouldn’t have.
ESL intervened and initially banned 3 coaches – including HUNDEN, who was hit the second hardest and was banned for 1 year. Later, the “Esports Integrity Commission” (ESIC) announced in a document that a total of 37 coaches were banned for cheating (via esic.gg).
For HUNDEN, the ESIC document lists two violations involving the Spectator Bug that he committed during his time as coach of Heroic. One of these violations occurred on May 19, 2020, against his future team Astralis.
Betrayal of his own team
Why was he banned the second time? In 2021, HUNDEN was involved in another scandal. The coach is said to have shared secret strategies with a competitor during a tournament. At that time, HUNDEN was still working as a coach for Heroic, but the team fired and sued its coach.
Later, the ESIC took up the case again, conducted an investigation, and banned HUNDEN from major tournaments for 2 years. He is banned during this period from ESL, Dreamhack, and BLAST tournaments.
How does the CS:GO community react? The community of CS:GO, especially the fans of esports, are reacting with a lot of criticism for Astralis. The signing of HUNDEN is facing massive backlash:
- Liam SleviN: “Absolutely ridiculous. The irony and lack of self-awareness must be at an all-time high for esports with this step (via Twitter).”
- Don Haci: “Absolutely shameless (via Twitter).”
- Jungle_CS: “Imagine falling as a team so far that you have to sign a cheater because you think he will save your team (via Twitter).”
- Poloolpp: “Astralis is really shameless (via Twitter).”
- petterlillhonga: “Thanks for the information. Please tell me when they decide to remove the cheater so I can follow Astralis again (via Twitter).”
However, the criticism of employing HUNDEN is nothing new. Already in 2020, there was strong backlash for Heroic when the team continued to employ the Dane despite the cheating ban (before he shared the secret information) and said: “HUNDEN is our boy. We love him […].”
Teams continue to employ banned cheater coaches in CS:GO: “A joke!”
