HuomaoTV, one of the most popular live streaming platforms in China, hosted earlier this month the Chinese regional qualifiers for the Valve sanctioned tournaments ESL One Los Angeles Major and StarLadder ImbaTV Minor.
In the said qualifiers, on the 18th of February, one Chinese team coming from open brackets displayed a very suspicious behavior, which put the match between Avengerls and Newbee under scrutiny for possible betting fraud. Despite the obvious match throwing actions of Avengerls, no investigation was announced by either Valve or any of the third party organizers.
- Read also: Avengerls and Newbee suspected of match fixing in the SL ImbaTV Minor qualifiers
However, a few days after the incident, HuomaoTV announced an internal investigation targeted at one of their employees, but they cited a completely different tournament. It’s stated in the official announcement that mister Xiaotian Xu admitted that he contacted forZe eSports for match fixing in the online Dota 2 tournament EGB.com Arena of Blood.
According to the HuomaoTV announcement, the company learned about the incident on the 19th of February. While no further comments were made by forZe, the aforementioned online event is set to begin tomorrow, February 24 and forZe are not listed among the participating teams and they’ve not been playing in the qualifier campaign for the tournament either.
It is unclear if Xiaotian Xu was also working on the Major and Minor qualifiers and if he had any involvement with the Avengerls throw in the Minor playoffs qualifiers. Coincidence or not, the Avengerls vs Newbee series took place a day before HumaoTV was notified about their employee attempt to manipulate the results in the EGB.com Arena of Blood.
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