It’s been another exciting 24 hours of UK eSports drama with an all to familiar name being at the centre of it, Charlie “K1NDEADLY” Weber.
Yesterday afternoon VATIC released an article about the dispanding of their old team, which K1NDEADLY was a part of, and them opening the doors to new applications. The article was pretty standard until it dedicated a whole paragraph to K1NDEADLY‘s “unprofessional behavior” at epicLAN being a primary reason why the VATIC team did poorly. When this article was shared across social media, there were split reactions about VATIC’s statement came across. Some praised their honesty about the situation, while others felt like an organisation shouldn’t pin blame on a player publicly like this.
Upon seeing this split in views, Matt Litherland, the co-founder of VATIC and author of the article, changed the article to remove this paragraph, but posted a long explanation on the UK CSGO Scene Facebook group defending his words. Mirroring the paragraph that kicked this whole thing off, Matt’s statement has also been deleted. This statement made allegations towards K1NDEADLY about the use of class A illegal substances at epicLAN and again suggested that these actions cost VATIC a higher placement at epicLAN. According to Matt what said, a heavy night of drinking and drug use caused K1NDEADLY to be unfit to play in their day 2 games as he was physically shaking from the effects of the previous night.
Matt tells all about K1N, but is it accurate?
However, be is the comedown of some massive night of drugs and alcohol, or it being a more accurate representation of what happened at epicLAN, K1NDEADLY has a slightly different tale to tell.
So on the run up to EPIC LAN, me and a mate were planning on getting a little giddy after games (but he didn’t end up doing anything) and i had asked MAT if this was okay, he said ‘yeah he does not mind as long as it is not obvious’ and it wasn’t…. people only found out because a loud mouth person saw it when i dropped it as i took money out of my pocket (so mat was aware from day 1 i was taking stuff with me, as were 2 of my team mates). First day of group games/elim games went horribly, things just werent going our way and we bombed out in 3rd place in our groups giving us a harder bracket… All be it I don’t think my performances were that bad, but I do accept this is the worst I had played personally at LAN but I was trying my best, I was in a slump on the run up to EPIC, I was having some major motivational issues due to some bad stuff occurring at work (which as a result now means I do not have a job) but again my team mates were all aware. I also was not toxic towards any of my team and my temperament was fine, I am sure if there was any issues someone would of told me. During the game vs Perilous I drank an energy drink late at night, which was incredibly stupid and I will never drink one that late again. As a result when we got back to the hotel I was outside with some other UK Players talking about the game we had just played, they offered me some tokes on a spliff to help me get to sleep and it worked, i was outside speaking for maybe 15 minutes tops, so no I was not up all night drinking, sniffing and smoking uncontrollably.
The next day my team mate had woke up 3 hours earlier than we needed and was talking all morning and he was proper pumped, it was nice to see but I was woken up at 6:30 when we didn’t have to meet until 9:30ish. I had a total of 3/4 hours sleep, and I really do not function properly on little to no sleep and I made everyone aware at breakfast I have not slept much and I apologised in advance if I was grumpy or quiet as that is what I get like when I am tired, so obviously I was already majorly annoyed. So with motivational issues, lack of sleep, food, performance issues and all sorts my head was all over the show.. I then asked a team mate if it was a good idea or not to have a ‘key’ this is a small amount that goes onto the tip of a key. He was aware and said ‘If it will wake me up, do what I have to do’ or something along those words. I was drinking water, it was also incredibly cold and as a result i was a bit shaky, I was also nervous if I am honest, but anyone who has played with me before will tell you the shakes etc are all part of my anxiety, and people have before told me to lower my sensitivity to combat the shakeyness (I also have the same shakeyness online) this anxiety has been caused by personal circumstances during a large gap away from counter strike which then resulted to substance abuse. It has toned down alot over the past 1.5 years of playing counter strike again.
Anyways, the first game we won… I felt like there was no performance issues, in the 2nd game I made a crucial mistake which put us into over time, but also clawed it back in the over time, yes my bad… There was a gopro video circulating of me and my team mates, and I don’t understand how it is being claimed ‘I was making everyone uncomfortable’ mostly cus i was pretty quiet and speaking when I had to. I did snap at Pommey once, but again I spoke to PEZ outside and apologised and I said sorry to pommey also (that was the 1 time I had snapped – over being flashed or something without a call, it was stupid) we lost the 2nd map in OT, and the 3rd map was a white wash… my team mates all left the venue and went to the pub together or something, I stayed at the venue with my mates. So yes, I then began to take stuff.. I told people I wasn’t / hadn’t because I felt embarrassed if I am honest, that was when I realised I had some issues, through out the whole time I was always with either GSR, Shaney or Shaney’s brother Josh, I was also sat with Logan, Snodz, Neggies also… Then some wild accusations get thrown about that I have poured water/beer or what ever on someones Keyboard, I’ll be honest they were big guys, I was drunk, tired and off my head towards the end of the evening and I did over react massivley to these accusations. I’m an honest guy and I am bored of hearing this stuff, I am not malicious and would NEVER EVER do anything like that…
Since LAN I havve taken my self to numerous rehab type of sessions and other drop in’s to sort my self out once and for all. As a result I said to VATIC in the whatsapp group ‘I am stepping down to sort my self out’ – They respected this choice and I took a couple weeks away to get started on sorting my life out. PEZ said I was always welcome to play with them in the remaining games etc so there was no bad blood.
In the mean while, I also want to take this time to apologise to everyone I have been a muppet towards in the past (Yes way in the past) and since I have returned I have made the best effort possible to integrate back into the community, but obviously my actions and other choices when I was younger have caused serious issues in an attempt to do this. I am a nice guy at heart with the best intentions 120% of the time, I just want to play and continue to try and improve at a game I love playing. Playing CS:GO has probably saved my life and I do not want to do anything to jeopardize my chances of perhaps one day playing with the top end of the scene. In the mean while I will continue to grind, and will hopefully see you guys at an event shortly.
Off the back of all this, epicLAN have responded to the use of drugs at their event by handing out a 2 year event ban to K1NDEADLY. I also spoke to iSeries about this and, although no official decision has been made yet, it sounds like he may dodge being hit by a ban hammer from them.
https://twitter.com/K1NDEADLYCSGO/status/763792688898605056
This fiasco also got picked up by Richard Lewis who published an hour long show on the latest drama to happen in the UK scene. Side note, Rich, if you’re reading this, pretty sure next beer is on you for not putting links in your description!
Matt also reached out to K1NDEADLY after all this exploded to apologise for how he acted, and admitted he may have got the wrong end of the stick.
It is great that Matt took the time to apologise, but when all the damage was done publicly, shouldn’t the apology be done just as publicly?
