Valorant tournament resumes after player is cleared of cheating

Play has resumed in the Valorant ORDER Ignition Series, after Riot Games’ Vanguard anti-cheat flagged up an EXO Clan player as suspicious — which led to an abrupt end to the broadcast. 

On July 24, Riot Games postponed the semifinals of the ORDER Valorant Open — the first Ignition Series event to be hosted in the Oceania region.

With plenty of eyes tuned in to see who would be the first team out of EXO Clan and Control to book their place in the Grand Final of the first Ignition Series Oceania Valorant tournament, the broadcast was brought to an unexpected end by Mitch ‘Conky’ Concanen.

“Unfortunately, we have had some news that the games will not be going ahead tonight, so unfortunately we will have to leave you with that,” Conky said after the livestream returned following a lengthy break.

Vanguard strikes again

After grinding their way through the Open Bracket all the way to the semifinal, EXO Clan’s Ethan ‘Crunchy’ Laker was flagged up by Riot’s Vanguard anti-cheat software as suspicious. This comes just 10 days after Riot paused the WePlay! Ignition Series tournament for similar reasons.

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The event was completely brought to halt until Riot’s investigation was complete. On July 25, Order released a statement to confirm that Riot’s review had been finalized and that EXO were eligible to finish the tournament.

“After further review conducted by Riot Games, we are replaying the match from yesterday after EXO Clan were cleared for competition.”

Keen to shed light on the matter, EXO Clan released a statement shortly after, confirming that Crunchy was the player in question, for reasons that have not yet been publicly announced.

“We were unaware of any issues with Crunchy prior to July 24, 2020 and deferred to Riot Games for judgment on the matter.”

EXO Clan earned a spot in the Grand Final, after taking down Control 2-1 in the semifinal replay. Dexerto has reached out to Crunchy and Riot Games for comment, and will update this article accordingly should either party provide their statement.