The CS:GO world is facing some uncomfortable questions after a host of star players revealed the true toll of playing professionally
For a long time injuries had not affected the results of major Counter-Strike tournaments but unfortunately that is no longer the case.
Two of the best three teams in the world were all hindered at the recent MLG Columbus, from the stand-out side fnatic to Na`Vi who are battling it out with Luminosity behind them.
Before the tournament, fnatic’s superstar olofmeister let fans know he had been having some issues with his wrist, leading to him being unable to practice ahead of the event.
In fact, now that the $1m major is over, his team have announced that they will be skipping DreamHack Malmo – set to begin next week with $250,000 up for grabs – in order to allow him to heal.
Na`Vi’s GuardiaN has also been suffering for a while with a wrist injury sustained, ironically, playing football rather than Counter-Strike.
It has greatly affected the play of Na`Vi’s carrying AWPer, given that the second best player in the world was mediocre both at MLG Columbus and IEM Katowice.
His team also pulled out of DreamHack Malmo to begin with, but will now be attending after all.
However, they will not practice with GuardiaN before the event, giving his hand – which was bandaged in Columbus during the evenings – more time to recover.
Interestingly, GuardiaN’s friend and Liquid’s star player s1mple revealed on his stream that the Slovakian superstar had played the grand final of the event using sensitivity of 5 – a multiple of roughly four times his usual mouse speed in order to avoid moving his arm.
Taking that into consideration, it is actually crazy to think that he played as well as he did.
In the past, fans had been able to demand that their favourite players play completely unreasonable amounts of Counter-Strike – up to ten hours a day, which is not sustainable – because there were no physical limitations.
But times change.
Following the news of olofmeister’s injury, many players took to Twitter to announce that they had been having similar issues, though none of them had participated at MLG Columbus.
Also affected have been cadiaN, Devilwalk, and Cloud9’s n0thing who had previously stated that his wrist was in bad enough condition that even typing on his phone hurt.
It is unclear exactly how widespread and how preventable the issue is, but it is clearly an issue nonetheless.
If this is not a wake-up call for players to realise that they need to see doctors and figure out ways to avoid such issues before they even begin, then what is?
If there were a players’ union, this would be a good time for them to get in touch with some healthcare professionals.
Some general advice would be helpful to make public to everyone, instead of only having players treated after the problems have begun.
It remains unclear whether certain mouse grips or aiming styles – wrist rather than arm, for example – make players more or less injury-prone. There are perhaps also other ergonomic factors in play that can help or hurt players.
It probably is not a perfect science, but there should be measures to be taken.
For now, players finally have a case for not playing 10 hours a day, every day.
Top professionals will always be motivated to put in more than 100 hours of play in the final two weeks leading up to the largest tournaments, and that is fine.
But is this the best case, to date, for an off-season?
In sports it is important to let the body recover in the off-season. So far, in the CS:GO era, our game has not had much of an off-season, and players have been vocal about the need for one.
Perhaps this is the final push that is needed to make sure that the tournament circuit is organised in a way that takes the players’ needs into account as well as the fans’.
Some of this comes down to pure dumb luck. Who knows what minor details led to GuardiaN’s injury playing football, for instance.
But the situation more generally can and should be improved upon. Injuries are simply not acceptable when they can be prevented.
MLG Columbus marked the first time in Counter-Strike that injuries truly affected results – and in a very public way.
Let’s hope that it will not become a new trend in our game.
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