The Esports Integrity Commission announced on Thursday that three coaches at the upcoming PGL Major Antwerp 2022 have been provisionally suspended for their use of a spectator bug variant.
ESIC to Imminently Issue Charges Resulting From Historical Spectator Bug Investigation
In the statement, ESIC identifies its intended treatment for three forms of Spectator Bug discovered which collectively impact 134 participants.
Read on our website: https://t.co/7VAkWjpKVd pic.twitter.com/aUMF39qOLH
— ESIC (@ESIC_Official) May 5, 2022
The ESIC announcement was part of an interim statement on their ongoing Counter-Strike: Global Offensive spectator bug investigation. The three unnamed coaches are being provisionally suspended from all ESIC member events for their use of the recently discovered “free-roam” variant of the bug.
A fourth coach was also identified as having used the “third-person spectator” variant of the bug. In the report, it’s stated the ESIC commissioner made the decision that this fourth coach would not be suspended from Antwerp for this less serious variant of the bug.
“The Commissioner takes the view that it would be unfair on the participant and would yield a disproportionate consequence impacting, not only the participant but their team to provisionally suspend them at this point,” the report reads.
One coach who made use of the free roam variant of the bug is Luis “peacemaker” Tadeu, according to a report from Jaxon. Peacemaker is also one of the coaches at the upcoming PGL Major Antwerp with Imperial Esports. This would mean that the 34-year-old Brazilian could be one of the three suspended coaches.
The third and final “static” variant of the coaching bug was the first to be discovered. In 2020, ESIC charged 37 coaches for their use of this exploit. The report released on Thursday added that another 47 participants were affected by the bug, bringing the overall total to 84.
ESIC made the decision to release this interim report ahead of their conclusion of the overall investigation. This was in part due to the lengthy timeline of the investigation, which has now been underway for years. There was also increasing public pressure for ESIC to begin issuing sanctions ahead of the upcoming PGL Major Antwerp.
