Tournament operator Elisa Esports suspended all Russian teams from participation

Tournament operator Elisa Esports, which specializes in CS:GO championships, has suspended all Russian teams from participation. At the same time, the restrictions apply only to Russian eSports organizations, regardless of the nationality of their players.

In support of Ukraine, all Russian-owned organizations are suspended from participating in tournaments by Elisa Esports until further notice.

This means that the organizers will not invite teams such as Virtus.pro, Team Spirit, Gambit Esports, forZe and other Russian-owned clubs. However, the restrictions will not affect NAVI, K23 or Entropiq, since these teams belong to other states.

The tournament operator is currently hosting the Elisa Invitational Winter 2021, which is scheduled to end on March 6th. There are eight teams left in the championship: HEET, ENCE, Entropiq, SKADE, Eternal Fire, HAVU, Dignitas and Copenhagen Flames.

Recall that earlier another tournament operator BLAST decided not to invite teams from Russia to their championships. The announcement affected not only BLAST Premier: Spring Showdown 2022, but also the upcoming WePlay CIS Masters: Spring 2022, which was canceled altogether.