With the opening matches of the League of Legends Mid-Season Invitational just a few hours away, one player has been hit with a ban.
Felipe “YoDa” Noronha of Brazil’s RED Canids has been slapped with a three-match ban after being found to have used “racially derogatory language” in a tweet yesterday.
According to a thread on Reddit, the player made a number of insults to Japanese players. He also allegedly suggested that Brazilian players should troll Korean players in solo queue while they were in the country for MSI.
Riot took swift action, and within hours had issued the ban. The player has also been fined $2,000.
“We expect professional players to maintain good behavior in and out of game and have zero tolerance for this kind of racially derogatory language,” Riot said in the ruling. “Although Noronha does not have any prior history of toxicity or other discipline infractions, pro players should demonstrate respect to other players and their cultures, and these actions clearly violated that principle.”
YoDa, who is a substitute midlaner for RED Canids, is one of Brazil’s most popular streamers. He has over 400,000 followers on both Twitter and Twitch. He will now miss all of RED Canids initial group stage games, meaning if the team does not advance he will lose any chance of playing at MSI.
RED Canids, who are being led by experienced coach Ram “Brokenshard” Djemal, will play Dire Wolves in just a few hours in the opening match of the MSI Play In phase. They are one of eight teams vying for three spots in the main event.
