BLAST Rivals Spring 2025 Semifinals: Team Vitality vs Team Spirit Preview, Predictions, and Results

2 May

Martin Arévalo-Östberg

Team Spirit is coming to put an end to Team Vitality's impressive streak of 23 matches without defeat. The two teams will face each other in the Semifinals of BLAST Rivals 2025 Season 1, with the encounter scheduled to take place Saturday, May 3rd, at 7 pm CET.

With two of the strongest teams in Counter-Strike 2 going head to head, who will triumph in this clash of titans?

Team Vitality Blasting Records

Although the end of last year was not particularly successful for Team Vitality, who sensationally dropped out of the Perfect World Shanghai Major 2024 at the Quarterfinals, after the change in the team, which took place in January 2025, the team under Rémy "XTQZZZ" Quoniam look simply unstoppable. The exchange of Lotan "Spinx" Giladi for Robin "ropz" Kool has already brought the players under the French organization's banner four titles in the space of just five months, securing the ESL Grand Slam.

Team Vitality at the moment boasts a series of 23 matches without defeat. At BLAST Rivals 2025 Season 1, the “Bees” have already defeated Wildcard by a score of 2-0, as well as MOUZ by a score of 2-1. While the former clash was not particularly challenging for Dan "apEX" Madesclaire's team, in the latter against Ludvig “Brollan” Brolin's company, the scenario of defeat for the favorites looked very real, when on Inferno after losing Mirage they were already losing 1 to 4. Eventually, Team Vitality pulled themselves together, however, and recorded an impressive series of rounds to take the match to a third map, where they also triumphed.

Team Sprit's Uneven Form

Team Spirit ended last year in excellent spirits compared to Vitality. The Russians won their first Major, beating FaZe Clan in the Shanghai final by a score of 2-1. Danil "donk" Kryshkovets' team also had a good start to the new year, winning BLAST Bounty Spring 2025, before falling to tomorrow's rivals at the Grand Final of IEM Katowice. In March, Spirit were knocked out of the ESL Pro League Season 21 and BLAST Open Spring 2025 during the Semifinals.

After a month-long break without a game, Spirit entered BLAST Rivals 2025 Season 1, where they first took down FlyQuest and then succumbed to Falcons by a score of 1-2. This defeat meant that the Russians had to start their adventure at the Playoffs from the Quarterfinals, where they met Wildcard. As expected, however, this was not an opponent that could in any way put up a fight against Team Spirit as the team confidently sealed their advance to the Semifinals after winning 13 to 7 on Anubis and 13 to 2 on Dust2.

Expected Maps

Team Vitality will certainly decide to ban Ancient at the very start. The dominant squad have not played this map even once in 2025. Team Spirit, on the other hand, are likely to reject Inferno for multiple reasons. Firstly, the Russians always skip this map, and secondly, it is at the moment the best the map of choice of their upcoming rivals.

Predicting which map Vitality will bet on tomorrow, on the other hand, may be difficult, as their win percentage on Anubis, Nuke or Train is over 80%, so the European team can afford the element of surprise. Spirit, on the other hand, is more likely to opt for Dust2 on their pick, where they surprisingly boast a higher victory percentage this year than their rivals.

Prediction

Vitality enter the Semifinals as clear favorites. Not surprisingly, the odds for apEX' team to win stand at 1.45, while the bookmakers estimate Spirit's chances of winning at 2.60. Nevertheless, this could be a very fierce clash, which will be beautifully complemented by the ZywOo vs donk duel.

Head-to-Head History

In 2025, the two teams faced each other only twice. At IEM Masters Katowice and BLAST Open Spring. Both times, Vitality were able to come out on top, winning 3-0 and 2-1, respectively. Who will win the bout this time? We will find out soon!

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Featured image credit: BLAST

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