CS:GO coach Nicolai “HUNDEN” Petersen said in an interview on Danish television that the Esports Integrity Commission is set to hand him a two-year coaching ban on Friday, Aug. 27. The reported ban will stem from allegations made by his former team, Heroic, that HUNDEN shared information about the squad’s strategies with a competitor.
HUNDEN alleges that the ESIC isn’t hearing his side of the story prior to finalizing its conclusion on Aug. 27. He also alleges that the ESIC is threatening him with a five-year ban if he chooses to appeal the verdict.
The controversy between Heroic and its now former coach began on July 28 when HUNDEN posted on Twitter that he was going to let his contract with Heroic run out. In that post, he addressed rumors that he “shared Heroic’s stratbook.” He denied those rumors, claiming that he shared anti-strat materials of opponents instead and saying that this was done in “the context of sparring.”
The next day, Heroic posted its own official statement. The org said the team unanimously decided not to compete with HUNDEN at IEM Cologne “due to severe trust issues.” Heroic alleges that after this, HUNDEN blocked access to the team’s strategy folder, then shared information from that folder “with a key individual at a major competitor.” Citing this as a “clear breach of contract,” Heroic terminated his contract, reported the actions to ESL and ESIC, and then began a legal process via the Denmark court system.
On the following day, ESIC made a statement that it was investigating the matter and said along with ESL that the alleged sharing of information did not affect the competitive integrity of IEM Cologne since the people who had been given access to it didn’t access it themselves. In that initial statement from ESIC, it said that HUNDEN’s behavior “could constitute a breach of the ESIC Integrity Program” and that it’d continue investigating.
HUNDEN has already received a 12-month ban from the ESIC regarding his participation in the coach spectating bug scandal that surfaced in 2020, but he had that ban reduced to eight months for his participation in the investigation. He’s also serving a five Major ban from Valve for the same offense.
ESIC announced on Aug. 24 that it received new information that could potentially impact the outcome of the release that was originally intended for Aug. 25, thus pushing back the release to 4am CT on Friday, Aug. 27.
