Ben Scott

October 24, 2019

Australasian Counter-Strike: Global Offensive roster, catman, has recently been caught in the crossfire of European esports organisation drama. Catman has become the victim of false contracts and put in the scenario where the owner of “Recursive Esports” doesn’t actually own the organisation.



Originally owned by Mikael Moisio, Recursive Esports was established back in 2012 with a primary focus on the European Counter-Strike: Global Offensive title. Strangely, an announcement went out on September 13th detailing the decision by Recursive Esports to acquire an Australian-based team. This team is made up of a mix of veterans and some younger players in the local Counter-Strike space.





Roster Announced:



Kyran “dizzyLife” Crombie

Cameron “disk0” Mac

Matthew “mattcd” Lenard

Benny “tensai” Phan

Jesse “lsnow” Tang





Suspicion was raised on September 10th, three days prior to the Counter-Strike roster announcement, when a user on Liquipedia attempted to change the ownership listing of Recursive Esports. The name was being changed from “Mikael ‘Tarantelo’ Moisio”, who was the old Chief Executive Officer of Recursive Esports, to someone called Jukka Savinainen, who claims to be the new Chief Executive Officer.



A credible source in the Counter-Strike community has since told us that these changes were initially rejected due to the lack of references proving the change of ownership. Eventually, “RecursiveeSports” who now use the handle “re_esport”, reached out to our source and convinced them the handle was bought from Mikael Moisio and Recursive Esports were re-entering Counter-Strike.



A few days after this, before the Counter-Strike: Global Offensive announcement, Jesse “lsnow” Tang reached out to our source to inquire about their thoughts on the supposed new ownership group of Recursive Esports. Conversation circled around how our source was only aware of assets being flipped as far as they knew, until Jesse “lsnow” Tang provided a contract from Recursive Esports and inquired if they could read over it to provide thoughts.



Our source said in a statement “I noticed how poorly written the contracts were and told Jesse (lsnow) that I had my suspicions about its legitimacy. The contract had a fake business registration number that didn’t even have the same number of digits that an EU Corporation is required to have. Also, I found it strange that they were offering $250 USD per player a week for a relatively new and unknown team. All of this seemed shady, so I told Jesse and advised him not to sign, but they did anyway.”

If you would like to read the contract provided to Catman, check it out here.



Recursive Esports’ Australasian Counter-Strike roster went on to compete in eight officially recorded matches under the Recursive banner, before eventually departing the organisation once their suspicions of the ownership group were confirmed.



Flash forward to October, Mikael ‘Tarantelo’ Moisio, the previous Chief Executive Officer of Recursive Esports, reached out to our source to confirm that no such sale of the brand took place, stating that Jukka Savinanen and Semen Mitrofanov had stolen it. Following that, Manu provided our spokesperson with a photo that shows the corporate filing to verify his ownership of the brand.



Conversations then began with the supposed new owner of the brand, Semen Mitrofanov, around whether or not he was the owner. He eventually shared a transaction screenshot that shows Many Moisio had transferred ownership for €2,000, however there are some inconsistencies with the screenshot. Recursive was not mentioned in the by-lines, and the phone number was British, despite Mikael Moisio living in Finland.





Above: Screenshot of supposed transaction made between the two parties.





Following the departure of the Australasian Counter-Strike roster, it’s been said that the team did not receive a single payment during their time at the organisation. A player from the team has since told our spokesperson that they had other offers from Australian organisations prior to signing with Recursive Esports.

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Since receiving this information, the false Recursive Esports brand has since changed its logo and handle, while also acquiring a European Counter-Strike: Global Offensive roster filled with multiple alleged cheaters. As stated, Catman have since returned to their self made team name of Catman for the time being. They currently sit atop of the Mountain Dew League in Australia.