Early reports have been proven correct as beastcoast announces multiple players have contracted COVID-19 while competing at The International 2022.
Not only does this mean some of bc’s players will have to play their upcoming series against PSG.LGD from isolation rooms, but the team will also be playing with a handicap.
According to beastcoast management, one player reported that they had a sore throat following the South American team eliminating Evil Geniuses in the previous round. This led to the team conducting rapid COVID tests across the board and finding that multiple players tested positive.
Valve was immediately notified once the positive results were confirmed, and action was taken for the team to play from isolation. However, while Valve will provide the team isolated rooms to continue competing, Valve has limitations that prevent beastcoast from playing their next series with at least one of their coaches.
“We immediately reported to Valve upon confirmed positive results,” beastcoast said. “Unfortunately, due to Valve’s limitations, our coach will not be provided an isolated room with a PC. This means we will be forced to play tomorrow’s games without our coach. This is extremely disappointing but we will still strive to do our best on the world stage.”
If the now deleted leaked internal report is to be believed, at least three players tested positive over the last 24 hours, which means this isn’t as bad as the previous situation with Royal Never Give Up, according to these preliminary details.
Despite RNG’s situation looking worse at first glance, beastcoast likely won’t have any players appearing on the main stage to compete because the testing window was much shorter between the positive results and the next series. Valve, PGL, and the org should take more precautions in this instance to ensure no other teams come into contact with a potential false negative player.
We also don’t know the current state of beastcoast’s players who did test positive.
Related: Entity’s controversial pause against Royal Never Give Up at TI11 was caused by a flying headset
In the case of RNG, the organization reported that it was very hard for some of its players to perform at a high level due to severe coughs, fevers, and other symptoms. The Chinese team still fought hard for nearly two hours before being eliminated by Entity, but the potential impact of COVID can’t be overlooked.
Beastcoast will play LGD in the opening series of TI11’s fourth day, and now it looks like a dangerous external factor could potentially cast a shadow over the results.
