diff --git a/pkg/gameservers/controller.go b/pkg/gameservers/controller.go
index 511d8a9877..f9c3fe0997 100644
--- a/pkg/gameservers/controller.go
+++ b/pkg/gameservers/controller.go
@@ -455,11 +455,6 @@ func (c *Controller) syncGameServerCreatingState(gs *v1alpha1.GameServer) (*v1al
 
 	c.loggerForGameServer(gs).Info("Syncing Create State")
 
-	// Wait for pod cache sync, so that we don't end up with multiple pods for a GameServer
-	if !(cache.WaitForCacheSync(c.stop, c.podSynced)) {
-		return nil, errors.New("could not sync pod cache state")
-	}
-
 	// Maybe something went wrong, and the pod was created, but the state was never moved to Starting, so let's check
 	ret, err := c.listGameServerPods(gs)
 	if err != nil {
@@ -734,7 +729,8 @@ func (c *Controller) syncGameServerRequestReadyState(gs *v1alpha1.GameServer) (*
 
 // syncGameServerShutdownState deletes the GameServer (and therefore the backing Pod) if it is in shutdown state
 func (c *Controller) syncGameServerShutdownState(gs *v1alpha1.GameServer) error {
-	if !(gs.Status.State == v1alpha1.GameServerStateShutdown && gs.ObjectMeta.DeletionTimestamp.IsZero()) {
+	if !gs.ObjectMeta.DeletionTimestamp.IsZero() ||
+		(gs.Status.State != v1alpha1.GameServerStateShutdown && gs.Status.State != v1alpha1.GameServerStateUnhealthy) {
 		return nil
 	}
 
diff --git a/test/e2e/gameserver_test.go b/test/e2e/gameserver_test.go
index fc2c070795..98484574b8 100644
--- a/test/e2e/gameserver_test.go
+++ b/test/e2e/gameserver_test.go
@@ -23,6 +23,7 @@ import (
 	e2eframework "agones.dev/agones/test/e2e/framework"
 	"github.com/stretchr/testify/assert"
 	corev1 "k8s.io/api/core/v1"
+	"k8s.io/apimachinery/pkg/api/errors"
 	"k8s.io/apimachinery/pkg/api/resource"
 	metav1 "k8s.io/apimachinery/pkg/apis/meta/v1"
 	"k8s.io/apimachinery/pkg/util/wait"
@@ -176,7 +177,11 @@ func TestUnhealthyGameServersWithoutFreePorts(t *testing.T) {
 	assert.Nil(t, err)
 
 	_, err = framework.WaitForGameServerState(newGs, v1alpha1.GameServerStateUnhealthy, 10*time.Second)
-	assert.Nil(t, err)
+	assert.NotNil(t, err)
+
+	_, err = gameServers.Get(newGs.Name, metav1.GetOptions{})
+	assert.NotNil(t, err)
+	assert.True(t, errors.IsNotFound(err))
 }
 
 func TestGameServerUnhealthyAfterDeletingPod(t *testing.T) {