Cover-Credits:
The League of Legends Champions Korea (LCK) announced that Fredit BRION (BRO) has forfeited its match against Gen.G (GEN) with a scoreline of 0-2 since the organization was unable to field a roster for the match. This was due to players of Fredit BRION and its academy team testing positive for COVID-19. This match was scheduled to kick off Week 9 of the 2022 LCK Spring Split alongside the series between Nongshim Redforce (NS) and KT Rolster (KT).
For its series against T1 on 13th March, BRO fielded its academy team – Fredit BRION Academy – in place of its starting lineup because multiple members of the team tested positive for COVID-19. T1 won that series comfortably by beating the team 2-0.
Before the match against Gen.G, the organization announced that its Academy solo laners were also down with COVID-19. On Twitter, it wrote, “We are sorry to announce that Soboro & Feisty tested positive for COVID today. Due to 2 members of our team’s emergency call-up team testing positive for COVID, Our team will not be able to field a team and will waive the match.”
LCK weighs in on the situation
With BRION’s Academy top laner Lim “Soboro” Seong-min and mid-laner Jeong “Feisty” Seong-hoon also testing positive for COVID-19, the organization did not have five players to take part in the match against GEN.G.
To provide clarity as to why the match could not be rescheduled, the LCK released a statement and explained the situation to the fans. The following are the protocols that the league follows in case of a COVID-19 outbreak in a team:
Substitutions within the main roster
(If 1 is not possible) Emergency call-up/send-down
(If 2 is not possible) Rescheduling of match
The league also pointed out that it had informed the teams that “for cases discovered within 2-3 weeks of playoffs if the game cannot resume before the Thursday before playoffs, the team will be handed a forfeit.”
The reason behind this decision is that the LCK does not have the liberty to push the schedule of the playoffs due to the Asian Games and international competition schedules. Additionally, the LCK had to consider the chances of teams playing back-to-back games and tie-breaker scenarios and that is the reason why it chose the Thursday before playoffs as the deadline.
The forfeit will hurt Fredit BRION which is in 5th place with a scoreline of 7-9 in the league. Although, the LCK also confirmed that Fredit BRION’s next match against Damwon Kia on 19th March will take place as planned.
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