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Because it takes a lot of time and money to set up an in-person tournament. A virtual one is basically free and will get a lot more participation from top players.

To be fair, what kicked out this whole saga was a real life match between him and Magnus Carlson. There are plenty of theories out there about how he could've cheated, some more absurd than others.

Also, there has been history of people cheating in IRL games by taking many bathroom breaks and looking up solutions while on break.

Pandemic happened that's the big reason.