Major esports organizer bans team sponsored by porn site

Major esports organizer ESL has banned the Team YP organisation from participating in their events across all games, VentureBeat reports.

The move comes not from any misconduct or inappropriate behaviour from Team YP or any of its players. Instead it has to do with the team's main sponsor - internet porn site YouPorn.

Team YP was created last year, and originally used the name Team YouPorn. But given the controversies that were expected to arise due to the team's name and sponsor, it quickly rebranded to Team YP and began distancing itself from the porn site. In fact, the team has scrubbed its logos, jerseys, websites and similar of all links and mentions of it relationship with YouPorn, to the point where you'd have to know about the team's history to make the connection.

But apparently those moves haven't been enough for ESL. In a statement to VentureBeat, the organizaiton writes:

"Advertising pornography is not legal in the markets we operate in, and the vast majority of partners we're working with have strict 'no drugs, no alcohol, no pornography' rules that we've contractually taken on board. These aren't new rules but ones that have been in our rulebooks for a long time. We have spoken to Team YP manager earlier this year, and in that conversation we've explained the situation and rules in detail and offered to look for potential alternatives in a bigger group. At the same time, we're consulting with our legal teams about this. We will inform the team and the management as soon as we have any updates."

Team YP is currently fielding an all-female Counter-Strike team and an Evolve team, and also sponsors individual players in Starcraft, Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat. None of them will be able to play in ESL events for the time being.

The Team YP organisation is obviously disappointed at the move, but have vowed to press on and work out a solution. ESL is among the biggest organiser of esports events and tournaments globally, so being banned from their events could have severe consequences for the team in the long term.