North American esports organization XSET has begun its search for a CS:GO roster today, despite still being under the shadow of claims it failed to pay wages to its VALORANT esports division over the last several months.
Four players and a coach from the NA org reportedly filed cases against XSET a month ago, including dephh, zekken, Cryocells, AYRIN, and ex-coach SyykoNT. Each case, all of which were filed against the org in California in August, pertained to owed proceeds from the Champions 2022 VALORANT skin bundle.
Each lawsuit alleges the XSET org failed to deliver on the merchandising revenue promise. Team members were originally meant to receive 50 percent of the revenue obtained through the Champions 2022 skin bundle.
Despite those claims remaining unresolved, XSET has set the wheels in motion to return to CS:GO and Counter-Strike 2 with a female playing roster.
The NA org previously fielded a female CS:GO roster in 2020 through to late 2021, with some decent results. While their original CS:GO endeavor lasted only a year, the previous XSET roster sported the likes of Julia “juliano” Kiran and Michaela “mimi” Lintrup, both of whom have become noteworthy members of the VALORANT esports scene.
Mimi and Juliano’s CS:GO squad garnered one first-place victory at Dreamhack Showdown Winter 2020 Europe, only losing two maps throughout the event. Success didn’t last long though; the squad dissolved one tournament later.
At the time, XSET pointed to struggles of the COVID-19 pandemic as the primary reason for the move, especially travel restrictions that impacted esports trips.
Dot Esports has reached out to XSET officials for further details.
