Windigo intends to sue WESG for prizes of 2018-19

Windigo Gaming щwner Artur Yermolaev said in a comment ещ HLTV.org that the organizers of the World Electronic Sports Games have not yet paid the Ukrainian club the prize money of $500 000 for the first place in the season 2018-2019, which ended a year ago. According to him, the conflict may escalate into a court case.

"We know that banks in China are open again and we understand that the company is functioning, even if some people are working remotely," Mr. Yermolayev says. He questions WESG’s continuous requests for information and documents, including team contracts and a player payment guarantee letter, even after other organisations had long received their prize money share, and insists that Windigo have never seen proof of a payment attempt from the Chinese tournament organiser. "It's a standard business practice to send a confirmation of payment. This way, even if there is some sort of a delay, we can approach our bank and explain to them the situation, and they can try to resolve the issue."

WESG representative in response to a request from HLTV.org responded that the company tried to make a bank transfer during November, but the payments did not meet the bank's requirements. The new Windigo Gaming account was received on the eve of the coronavirus outbreak in China, which resulted in a temporary blockage of banks' operation. After returning to work, it turned out that the contracts between Windigo and the players in its squad were no longer valid, so WESG needed new documents, which were received only recently - April 8.

At the end of October 2019, Windigo Gaming ceased its operations due to financial difficulties. The club's co-founder and managing partner Maxim Bednarski explained that one of the main reasons for the decision was a delay in the payment of prizes by the organizers of several major LAN tournaments, including WESG 2018-2019 World Finals.

World Electronic Sports Games championships is running since 2016. Each of the first two CS:GO tournaments in the series had a record prize pool of $1,500,000 for the discipline, while the following season it has been reduced to $890,000. In the WESG 2018-2019 World Finals Grand Finals, Bulgaria's Windigo Five defeated the AGO team to win half a million dollars for first place.