ptkovsky
Riot Games company, which is a North American video gaming developer, publisher, and global esports tournaments operator, recently announced their another rather strict competitive ruling against one of the East Asian professional League of Legends players, who just recently competed at one of the company’s biggest tournaments and annual events — the 2021 World Championship.
The ruling
The suspect is 18-year-old Chien “Maoan” Mao-An. The professional League of Legends player from Taiwan is a mid laner competing for Beyond Gaming team.
Riot in their recent Twitter post quoted the official statement which was issued by Tom Martell, who is the director of operations and production at LoL Esports:
Competitive Ruling: Chien "Maoan" Mao-An pic.twitter.com/x4c8Lhw5n7
— LoL Esports (@lolesports) October 8, 2021
It is said that the Taiwanese professional player supposedly violated some of the rules from the company’s competitive ruleset. Riot Games is known to strictly prohibit their esports professionals to associate themselves with any sorts of gambling, bookmaking, and betting operations.
Riot believes that they have comprehensive evidence of the young Asian mid laner providing some of the sensitive insider information to one of the third parties, which were implicated with the gambling operations regarding the ongoing Worlds series event.
According to Riot’s statement, Maoan is said to be suspended for the remainder of the Worlds 2021 event, as the North American video game company initiated additional investigating measures in order to clarify the current unclear situation.
Maoan is the starting mid lane player for the fully Taiwanese roster of Beyond Gaming who previously played for another Taiwanese team Berjaya Dragons, an esports organization originating from Malaysia and backed by their government, since January 2020.
Berjaya Dragons
With his former Berjaya Dragons squad, the young talent placed fourth during the regular season of the PCS 2020 Spring split. The deciding Berjaya Dragons vs Nova Esports tiebreaker match was lost with the 0:1 score by the Nova Esports squad from Hong Kong.
The Dragons then were able to finish only 5-6th place and earn $4,500 at the next PCS 2020 Spring Playoffs event. In the lower bracket matchup between Berjaya Dragons vs Hong Kong Attitude, the winners were the HKA team with the 2:0 score.
During the tournament, Maoan’s BJD team managed to win against Alpha Esports and then lose to Machi Esports in the upper bracket, and then lost again to the opposing Hong Kong Attitude roster in the second round of the lower bracket of the PCS Spring Playoffs 2020 competition.
Then, the Berjaya Dragons squad finished only 8 place at the PCS 2020 Summer tournament with the rather poor 6-12 record in games during the split, but eventually became the last team to qualify for the playoffs of the PCS event. The Berjaya Dragons vs ahq e-Sports Club battle in the lower bracket finished 1:3 in favor of the ahq team.
Beyond Gaming
After playing for Berjaya Dragons organization for more than a year, the young Taiwanese mid laner was able to join his current team — Beyond Gaming. The transfer of the player happened in March 2021.
Maoan’s current BYG esports organization was created at the beginning of the year, in January 2021. The newly-formed Taiwanese team was founded by Xue Hong-Wei, known as DinTer, who previously competed for strong teams in the region such as the legendary Taipei Assassins, also Hong Kong Esports, and HK Attitude.
The 30-year-old professional League of Legends player was able to acquire the slot of the ahq eSports Club team in the Pacific Championship Series league.
Beyond Gaming’s LoL team is currently rated as the second best squad competing in the PCS region, which hosts some of the best LoL teams coming from Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, and also the Southeast Asian region.
Throughout the latest 2021 PCS season, the Taiwanese squad was able to hold their place in the top. In March, they placed first at the PCS 2021 Spring event.
The BYG team finished this split in second place with a strong 16-2 record in the regular season and qualified for the PCS 2021 Spring Playoffs, only losing to the mighty PSG Talon roster and Machi Esports.
In the PCS 2021 Spring Playoffs tournament, the BYG team came second to the finish of the event. During the Spring tournament, they first defeated their past offenders in the Beyond Gaming vs Machi Esports matchup — 3:1.
Then they moved on to play in the upper bracket finals against the PSG.Talon team. The Beyond Gaming vs Talon Esports match was lost by Maoan’s team with the 0:3 score.
Dropping to the LB finals, the Taiwanese squad was able to come back, as they fought their way to the grand finals of the tournament through the full Bo5 series against their rivals — Machi Esports, but only to lose 0:3 to the likes of the dominant PSG.Talon team.
The last series of events before the main Worlds 2021 tournament for the strong Taiwanese roster were the PCS 2021 Summer and PCS 2021 Summer Playoffs events. During the initial tournament, Maoan’s team once again showcased great performance, finishing the split with the 14-4 record.
In the final Summer Playoffs event of the PCS region in 2021, the BYG team was able to come second and qualify for the Worlds 2021 Play-in stage. For this achievement, BYG defeated the Machi team and even managed to win this time against the likes of the top-rated PSG.Talon team in a close Bo5 match, which ended with the 3:2 score in favor of the underdogs.
PSG fell down to the lower bracket, where they were able to easily outplay J Team, who were unable to fully compete against the likes of Talon roster. The J Team vs PSG Talon match ended with the 0:3 score in favor of the region’s top squad.
The finals of the PCS 2021 Summer Playoffs event were really interesting this time, as both teams played it out till the very end. The full Bo5 series finished with the close 3:2 score in favor of the favorites — the avenging PSG.Talon organization.
Talon became the first team entering the Worlds 2021 stage from the PCS region, starting directly in the main group stage in group C of the ongoing offline event held in Iceland, while Beyond Gaming team came second, earning $14,000 against the competitior’s more than two times bigger $30,000 prize money.
Worlds 2021
The Beyond Gaming team with Maoan in the mid lane was unable to perform at their best during the Worlds 2021 event, starting their path in group B of the play-in stage. Worlds 2021 started with plenty of exciting matches to watch out for.
The Taiwanese team finished third place in the second group of the stage, which also included Japanese squad DetonatioN FocusMe, United States‘ Cloud9 team, Galatasaray Esports roster from Turkey, and also Unicorns Of Love from the Russian region.
The BYG team finished the group stage at Worlds 2021 play-ins with the 1-3 record. The Taiwanese team won the tiebreaker map against the Russian UOL squad, and headed to the second play-in round of the tournament also known as the knockout stage.
Beyond Gaming team fought well, as they managed to outplay the Turkish Galatasaray organization. The Beyond Gaming vs Galatasaray Esports duel in the close Bo5 series finished with the 3:2 score in favor of the Taiwanese.
In the final qualification match, BYG team faced the mighty Koreans from the Hanwha Life Esports organization. The Taiwan vs Korea matchup Hanwha Life Esports vs Beyond Gaming finished 3:0 in favor of the LoL squad led by the experienced Kim “Deft” Hyuk-kyu.
At the end of the day, Beyond Gaming did not make it to the main group event and placed 17-18 in Worlds 2021 standings, earning about $40,000 in prize money.
The Taiwanese team joined the likes of the other bottom teams, such as Australia‘s PEACE from the Oceanic region, RED Canids squad from Brazil, and also Infinity Esports team from Latin America‘s Costa Rica, who are residing in Mexico.