BLAST Decide Against Introducing New Coaching Limitations

Reacting to the recent news of VALVE introducing new restrictions for coaches during online RMR events, the Danish tournament organizer BLAST has announced that they will not implement similar rules for the upcoming group stage of BLAST Premier: Spring 2021.

The company has explained that they have effective mechanisms to monitor coaches actions during matches in real-time, so that they will be able to ensure competitive integrity. They believe that coaches “provide a vital role in esports, improving quality of play and team performance”. However, the company will monitor the situation and might change this decision after the tournament.

Earlier last week VALVE announced new rules for online RMR-events, which prohibit coaches to be in the same room or server with players, as well as to communicate with them in any way.

This was done in a response to the ESIC investigation, which accused 37 coaches in a camera bug abuse. Besides introducing new rules, VALVE also banned the accused coaches from participating in a number of upcoming majors: depending by the extent of the abuse, some coaches will be banned from only one major, while some – from all of them.

BLAST Premier: Spring Groups 2021 will be played on February 4th – 14th, featuring 12 teams competing in three GSL groups. The event’s prize pool is set at $150,000. Best six teams of the group stage will advance to the seasonal finals, while the rest will compete in the Showdown stage.