The issue of rigged matches has always been relatively sensitive when it comes to the CIS esports scene. Local community have a rather negative attitude to this practice, that is why they even had created the term “322”. Actually it was the idea of fans so today we’ll speak about who is Solo, what is “322” and what Xiao8 will eat in case of losing the dispute.
The situation with “322” occurred in 2013 when Alexey Solo Berezin played in the RoxKis team against zRage at Starladder Star Series Season 6. Alexey made a $100 bet against himself with 3.22 coefficient. RoxKis lost and Alexey was supposed to receive $322, but the hoax had been uncovered and Alexey received nothing. In addition, he was kicked out of the organization and banned from participating in several Valve tournaments.
These 322 dollars became not only one of the classical Dota memes but also the main precedent for the game developer’s interference in the internal affairs of esports. Valve held a number of briefings with players and issued that any violation would result in a life-time ban from all Valve-sponsored events. Also other big tournament organizers do not invite such players as well.
Alexey didn’t repeat his mistakes, but there were other match fixing scandals. In Southeast Asia, for example, there were several cases. In 2015 Mineski intentionally lost their match against MSI TRIC in the Asian division of Starladder Season 10. As a result, three members of Mineski and the entire MSI team were banned from participating in tournaments.
A similar case also occurred at the Cynergy League 2014, when bets were placed from new accounts on Arrow vs CSW match. The players themselves denied everything, but over time the deception was discovered. All participants were banned and never participated major tournaments.
It seems that after a series of bans in 2014-2015, the players realized that cheating at a high level is not worth it, and the consequence can be severe, but the Chinese are not as simple as they seem. It’s no secret that Tier 3 teams in the Chinese region constantly fixing matches with each other in order to earn some money. The competition level in the region is high, so not everyone can make it up and the rest have to survive.
However, recently EHOME’s coach Zhang “Xiao8″ Ning suspected Newbee’s players in a fixed match that took place during the Chinese qualifiers for StarLadder ImbaTV Dota 2 Minor Season 3. In this match Avengerls lost the second map while having a huge advantage.” Director” immediately suspected them in a “foul play” and said that the match was fixed. His suspicions were supported by Chen Zhou Yao, who had also broadcasting the match.
Reddit’s users noted that Avengerls players were already involved in a number of unpleasant activities: boosting and accounts reselling, which only increases the likelihood of fraud from the player’s side. Xiao8 itself stated that he would eat its feces on live if it turns out that this match is not purchased.
In this case, it is almost impossible to directly prove that this match was deliberately lost. Apparently, the players didn’t place bets on the match, so there would be no help from bookmakers. You will have to check the transaction history of both teams’ management and inject a truth serum to the players еo expose the team so that they will tell the truth.
And if you can still do something with fixed matches, then in the situation with Nigma team everything is a bit more complicated. Let us recall Nigma played BO3 match with Aggressive Mode in the lower bracket of WePlay! Tug of War: the Mad Moon. On the second map Nigma players switched their roles and lost.
At the same time there were no sanctions from the tournament organizers or developers. In fact, the players deliberately lost the match, what can be equated to the match-fixing, since one of their friends could freely make a bet.
Unfortunately, at the moment ESports has not yet reached the same level as football. The commentator and former player Kyle expressed his opinion as follows:
“You come here to the last tournament your team is going to play, for a month and a half, and you put W33 offlane, GH jungle, Kuroky on a Core mid and Miracle on a hard support. What is this? How arrogant do you have to be? This is disrespectful to your opponent, (and) to your brand.
You are representing your own organization. Do you want to get sponsored? This is how you think you are going to get it? Is there a circus in town? Do you think they need more clowns? It is ridiculous.”
And it is true that now everything is based only on the desire of players to win. According to the developers, it’s the main motivation and limiter. As we can see, infantile players still prevail and until they aren’t put within the clear boundaries of what is allowed, ESports would remain something “not very serious” that has great potential but unable to use it.
Photo credit: Valve
