Team Spirit defeated OG 2–1 in the opening round of BLAST Bounty Season 2, but the world’s top-ranked VRS team came within a few rounds of an early elimination.
Spirit dominated OG’s Cache pick 13–4 before struggling on their own selection. OG punished a disjointed Spirit attack on Dust2 and closed the map 13–11, forcing the series onto Ancient.
Ancient initially appeared comfortable for Spirit, who built a 9–3 lead on the CT side. OG then produced an equivalent 9–3 defensive half to reach overtime, driven by strong mid-round decisions and individual impact from Adam “adamb” Ångström. Spirit eventually recovered to win 19–16 after double overtime.
Danil “donk” Kryshkovets finished the series with a 1.51 rating and 77 kills, while Dmitry “sh1ro” Sokolov recorded a 1.24 rating. OG’s adamb delivered a 1.39 rating and 95.0 ADR despite the defeat.
The result keeps Spirit in the tournament, but their performance was less convincing than the scoreline suggests. Losing Dust2 was concerning; allowing a 9–3 advantage to disappear on Ancient made the series considerably more dangerous.
Spirit still had enough individual quality to recover, particularly through donk and sh1ro. However, needing that level of output against the lowest-seeded team in the matchup points to problems in their offensive structure rather than simple early-tournament rust.
For OG, the defeat still offered meaningful evidence of progress. Their coordinated comeback on Ancient showed that they could challenge an elite opponent across full rounds rather than relying only on isolated individual plays. The remaining issue is conversion: OG created a genuine upset opportunity but could not finish it once Spirit stabilized in overtime.
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BLAST Bounty Season 2 starts on July 21, with 32 teams entering the online stage. The opening day is led by two roster storylines: Astralis play their first official match under NEO, while MOUZ debut the completed lineup built around PR and new in-game leader xertioN.
Astralis appointed NEO as head coach and Xirreth as performance coach to build a stronger support structure. The move looks logical, but the team still needs to prove it can become stable after another rebuild.
MOUZ signed PR as a familiar academy-developed rifler to complete their rebuild. The move fits their long-term development model, but the new roster still needs time to prove stability.
BLAST will bring a top-level Counter-Strike event to Mongolia in 2027. BLAST Open Ulaanbaatar is scheduled for May 10–23, with 16 teams competing for a $1.25 million prize pool through a combination of Valve Regional Standings invitations and regional qualifiers.
