Referee who Revealed CS:GO Scandal: „I Opened Pandora's Box”

Esports referee Michal „Michau” Slowinski spoke about the scandal on the professional Counter-Strike: Global Offensive scene, which concerns the use of a glitch to the team's advantage. The Pole was responsible for bringing the case to light and said it was like „opening Pandora's box”.

A scandal on the professional Counter-Strike: Global Offensive scene, involving many coaches who have used a glitch to watch the map from different locations, seems to have no end. Polish esports referee Michal "Michau" Slowinski, who was instrumental in revealing the scandal, told us a little bit more about the scandal in a recent interview for esportsheaven.com.

He admitted that at the beginning, when the case with using the bug by coaches came to light, he had his hands full. Together with another referee, he worked 12-hour shifts to review as many matches from recent years as possible in the shortest possible time. It was also thanks to Slowinski, among others, that the case came to light at all and, as he said himself, it was like opening a Pandora's box, which will surely have a significant impact on the professional CS scene.

“I realize that unfortunately I opened a Pandora's box and this is going to be one of the biggest scandals in CSGO history and it’s going to hurt our scene a lot. Obviously it was never my intention to hurt the scene, for money or followers or whatever. I do believe that competitive integrity is something we must protect at all costs and in my eyes, this is exactly what I was doing.”

It's hard not to agree with his words. Pulling this scandal into the limelight meant that some of the established coaches will have to say goodbye to their careers, and the stigma of cheating can last. On the other hand, it is a big step towards improving the quality of the professional scene, which can now gain some fresh air.

Let's recall that the first reports on the subject of the bug appeared at the beginning of September this year, and at the end of the month, more abuses of the bug over the past years have come to light. So far 40 coaches have been banned, but still not all game records have been checked, so we can expect more to follow. A full interview with Slowinski, in which he also talks about the backstage of being an esports referee, can be found here.