EFLARE and the Missing $100K Prize Pool

Who owns EFLARE and why won't they pay players the $100K USD they owe them?

It has been more than six months, or 28 weeks, or 198 days since the EFLARE $100K SEA Counter-Strike 2 Tournament concluded on Nov. 19, 2023, but the winners of the actual tournament have not seen any of their prize money, according to multiple sources who have spoken to The Esports Advocate over the last several months.

So how did all of this happen? The story—as told by multiple sources familiar with the situation—is that a Hong Kong businessman known only as “Chris Lin” and some other unknown partners approached Bleed Esports CEO Mervyn Goh about running a tournament exclusively for Southeast Asia to commemorate the launch of Counter-Strike 2.

Sources tell us that Goh had always been keen on creating competitions that support SEA, so he agreed to work with this group of business people, who presented him with a budget, timeline, and vision for the competition. EFLARE’s shadowy pointman said that the company was in the process of establishing itself officially as a business in Hong Kong and convinced Goh to front some of the money needed to initially put together a team to operate this online tournament.

To get it all off the ground, Goh reached out to a former Bleed employee—Charnjit “s3rius2k1” Singh—who in turn began putting together a team to handle production, social media, casting, and tournament organization. Singh wasn’t concerned about the validity of this company or the endeavor because Goh was the point of contact for EFLARE, and had worked with him in the past, so he felt that his involvement lent legitimacy to the tournament.

He pulled together a team very quickly. Some people needed to be paid upfront, though a handful of people–including Singh and caster Mamoon “TeaTime” Sabri—agreed to be paid in full at the conclusion of the event. Goh spent his own money to pay some of the talent in advance, according to sources, to the tune of roughly $23K USD.

EFLARE opened accounts on social media and streaming channels in early October 2023, and made its very first post on Oct. 26, noting that “There’s a NEW sheriff in town! Make way for EFLARE,” followed by another message asking, “What’s a GOOD prize pool for a #CS2 tournament in SEA?”

Also on Oct. 26, it officially announced its debut Counter-Strike 2 tournament for Southeast Asia, with a total prize pool of $100K. Registrations opened on Oct. 27, 2023, with open qualifiers taking place Nov. 10-12, 2023, and playoffs running Nov. 13-19, 2023, according to the initial announcement.

Twenty teams qualified for Open Qualifiers, and went on to compete (from Nov. 10-12, 2023) for one of eight spots in the Playoffs on Nov. 13, 2023. The final teams to make it through to the playoffs included Ez Esport, Expor Esport, ICARUS, Darkside, Kings of Losing Clutches, Balloon Animals, Hyper5, and Saligogerd. Eight teams were directly invited to the event including Ongeh Warriors, Dreamscape, EZPZ, MungYu Esports, DoNotDisturbLa, Young Danger, OS-Esports, and Old Goats. The playoffs ran from Nov. 13-18, 2023, followed by a semi-finals and a grand final on Nov. 19, 2023. Ultimately, the following teams took the lion’s share of the $100K:

1st place – Ongeh Warrior – $50K

2nd place – MungYu – $25K

3rd place – Dreamscape $15K

4th place – Darkside $10K

As we noted earlier, it has been more than six months since the EFLARE tournament concluded and when we began digging into this story in March, only one person had been paid—Mervyn Goh—and that was after months of back-and-forth between him and his contact. TEA had planned on reporting on this story at that time, but there was some hope that staff–who were owed close to $30K at the time–would be paid. And in fact, in May all but one person who worked on the event were paid in cryptocurrency. As of this writing, only one person on staff hasn’t been paid: Mamoon “TeaTime” Sabri.

Sources tell us that when Sabri signed on to the tournament he was specifically told that he would be paid by bank transfer because it is illegal in his home country of Pakistan to accept cryptocurrency. Despite agreeing to this, EFLARE through intermediaries basically told Sabri in May that they could only pay him in crypto, but he refused, as it is illegal for him to accept crypto and convert it into cash outside of his home country through a third party would create a tax burden for whoever handled that transaction. It is clear that whoever is pulling the strings at EFLARE does not have access to a traditional bank account and is using cryptocurrency for all of their transactions.

It should be noted that TEA could not find an esports company called EFLARE registered in Hong Kong or anywhere else in the world, and since there are numerous people named “Chris Lin” in Hong Kong, it’s hard to pinpoint just exactly who the organizers of this event and officers of the company really are. In fact, it could be that EFLARE is a figment of someone’s imagination at this point.

In messages from January viewed by The Esports Advocate, people referred to the point-person as the “EFLARE Hong Kong guy,” but no one had any real names or an exact location for the company at the time. In fact, outside of its accounts on Instagram, Twitter/X, YouTube, Twitch, and a Discord channel (created by Singh), EFLARE doesn’t exist anywhere else (no website, no company registration that we could find under that name registered anywhere related to esports or gaming). The only point of contact for the company are email accounts on Gmail and Protonmail.

Players Left Hanging

In late January, one of the winning teams reached out to EFLARE asking for an update on the prize payout. The person on the other end of that conversation blamed its payment processor:

“The initial payment processing company appointed is facing significant hurdles to process the payment. As a result, we are seeking alternative payment providers. Kindly provide a lead time of 2-3 months for the issue to be resolved.”

It has been months since that message was sent, and EFLARE has ceased communication altogether with players inquiring about prize money.

Over the last several months Goh claimed that he had been pushing to be reimbursed the money he paid out of his own pocket to get the tournament going. Sources tell TEA that Goh has been paid in full for the money he initially spent, and in May everyone except Sabri.

In April and May, players were told to send their crypto wallet information to EFLARE emails, but the players we spoke to this week tell us that they have not received any kind of response after doing so.

Ultimately everyone who earned prize money during the EFLARE $100K SEA Counter-Strike 2 Tournament has been left hanging, with zero communication from tournament organizers since January.

Bleed Esports Members’ Participation

TEA has also learned that, while Bleed Esports didn’t have an official presence in the competition, several members of its Valorant esports team (which competes in Valorant Champions Tour Pacific, or VCT Pacific) participated under the team name “Old Goats.” Old Goats was composed of Bleed players including Jacob “yay” Whiteake (a former CS:GO player and active Bleed player), Nikola “LEGIJA” Ninić (Valorant coach for Bleed), Ngô “crazyguy” Công Anh (currently on the inactive roster of Bleed), Jorell “Retla” Teo (an active Bleed player), and Derrick “Deryeon” Yee (an active Bleed player). It is unclear if those who participated in the competition knew Riot’s rules about competing in third-party competitions outside of the VCT ecosystem.

According to our sources, Riot Games caught wind of Bleed members participating in the event and were not thrilled about it because teams are required to get prior approval before competing in any third-party competitions. Ultimately, Old Goats withdrew from the competition.

A Riot spokesperson told TEA last month:

“As part of our agreement with partnered teams, we require them to obtain our prior approval if their rosters are planning to participate in third-party tournaments. On November 29, 2023, our Competitive Operations team issued Bleed Esports a warning for failing to notify the league office that the team was participating in this third-party event. By that time, Bleed had already withdrawn from the event.”

Given Goh’s deep participation in putting this tournament together, it is tough to imagine that Bleed leaders and/or players didn’t know he was an integral part of it, which could create a conflict of interest, or at the very least, the appearance of impropriety.

TEA will continue to follow this story as it develops.