Update 02/06/2020:
- Updated article to clearly show that Phanta disrupted only the CSGO match, and not COD4
- Removed the statement saying Phanta poked the TM players
- Updated sentence to reflect that a ban on Phanta will be enforced by Gamer.LK and SLESA in the future
The Women’s Cyber Games event is organised with the strategic goal of getting more Women into Esports. Gamer.LK will take necessary action in its power to protect ALL Women participants from bullying and toxic behaviour regardless of their clan.
Gamer.LK in an effort to promote Esports to women gamers in the country organises the annual Women’s Cyber Games championship, featuring multiple popular Esports titles played in the country. The event in 2019 received 200+ registrations, and that grew to double in 2020 with over 500 registrations. Chosen titles which have more than 8 teams are considered eligible to be included in an overall clan award, which is presented at the end of the tournament to the best performing clan. COD4 and CSGO, with 5 and 3 teams respectively did not reach the minimum threshold to be included in the points system. Therefore these matches were played as exhibition matches in order to provide the registered teams an opportunity to compete with other women-only teams, a chance they would not get in any other tournament in the country.
Consisting of some of the top tier women-FPS players in Sri Lanka, Team Sparkle from Tech Morph and Vendetta from Noob Alliance fought their way into the finals of CSGO team event. Team Apostrophe from Tech Morph and Team Elementrix from Noob Alliance reached the finals of the COD4 team event.
Due to delays in new players readying-up for tournament participation in the early rounds, the finals of the event was pushed back 2 hours beyond the scheduled time. Due to this time change, Team Apostrophe of Tech Morph was unable to participate during the re-scheduled time. In addition, Team Elementrix of Noob Alliance was unwilling to play on another day. With no finals being played, the COD4 team exhibition event was called off with no result.
On the 31st of May, the CSGO match between the two finalists commenced and proceeded smoothly just beyond half time. Shortly thereafter major disruption was caused to the nA Teamspeak channel by Tech Morph member Phanta. He had joined the nA team channel, disrupted the players and spam pinged them to the point they were unable to play further. This caused severe pause delays to the match, and both teams informed referees that they are no longer willing to play the match. Therefore due to non-completion of the finals, the CSGO team exhibition event was called off with no result.
Gamer.LK thanks the admins of Tech Morph in assisting in the investigation of the disruptive behaviour. Action will be taken against Himath “Phanta” Hettige by Gamer.LK and the Sri Lanka Esports Association in due course.