Another Counter-Strike player banned for cheating

Another big name in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive has been banned today, and DreamHack has taken quick action as a result.

Gordon “Sf” Giry of French team Epsilon is the latest player to be banned by Valve’s anti-cheat system, following  Hovik “Kqly” Tovmassian and Simon “smn” Beck earlier this week.

Like Tovmassian, Giry originally made his mark on the international Counter-Strike scene as a member of Clan Mystik. Left on the outside of a French roster shake-up involving Titan and LDLC, Giry made his way to Epsilon. The team has produced middling results since the move, and will now likely be without the services of Giry for the foreseeable future.

With both Epsilon and Tovmassian’s Titan squad suffering from player bans, the organizers of next week’s DreamHack Winter tournament were left in a lurch.

Both teams were scheduled to participate in the $250,000 competition. Now, DreamHack has decided to disqualify both of the French squads.

They will be replaced in the 16-team tournament by two squads from a snap qualifier to be held this weekend. That live qualifier will feature four European Counter-Strike teams, each of whom will have their travel to Sweden paid for by Valve.

Beck’s ban by ESEA would seem to be the catalyst for the bans leveled against Tovmassian and Giry.

ESEA’s Eric “lpkane” Thunberg took to the website’s forum to discuss the bans and the role ESEA has played. Thunberg has said that after Beck was caught, Valve reached out to ESEA to discuss how the player’s cheating was detected. That discussion led to Valve implementing new anti-cheat measures, which were apparently enough to catch Tovmassian and Giry.

With fans wondering if more players are still to follow, Thunberg cryptically offered that there was “more to come soon.”

Image via Valve