Vitality best Spirit to reach Lisbon final

Vitality are bound for another grand final clash with MOUZ.

Vitality have taken down Spirit 2-1 in the semi-finals of BLAST Open Lisbon, bagging a dominant win on Anubis (13-6) before getting dominated on Nuke (5-13) and eventually rebounding with a hard-fought Mirage victory (13-10).

Vitality's reward for their win is another grand final matchup against MOUZ, giving MOUZ an opportunity for revenge after Vitality made quick work of them in their last grand final meeting at ESL Pro League Season 21, while Vitality aim for their third trophy of the year.

Date	Matches
BLAST Open Lisbon 2025
30/03/2025	MOUZ 17:30 Vitality	Match

Vitality recover from their lowest low so far

Vitality kicked off this semi-final with a dominant victory on Spirit's pick of Anubis, quickly racking up a 13-6 scoreline thanks to stellar team play and strong individual play from everyone barring Robin "⁠ropz⁠" Kool.

Despite the strong start, Vitality soon encountered the worst-case scenario, as the team bagged their fewest rounds in a map loss since adding ropz, claiming just five rounds on their pick of Nuke before Spirit forced the Mirage decider.

When Vitality needed him most, ropz found his footing on Mirage, spearheading his team's efforts on the series decider alongside Mathieu "⁠ZywOo⁠" Herbaut. Spirit managed to briefly wrest control of the map despite the superstar duo's efforts, but support from the remaining Vitality members helped get the team over the line 13-10.

"It wasn't hard [to get back into the game]," ropz shared in a post-match interview. "I had a couple of oopsies on Anubis, part of it was some anti-strats which worked really well, but I didn't hit the shots and that's on me."

Vitality look to leave their mark in the records

In addition to having the pleasure of reaching yet another grand final, Vitality will also certainly be pleased by the fact that they have now secured 15 series wins in a row, putting them in the same league as some of Counter-Strike's most storied lineups.

While Vitality are miles from Ninjas in Pyjamas's illustrious 60-match streak, the team are now in joint-fifth-place alongside 2021 Natus Vincere, who hoisted the trophy at PGL Major Stockholm, and 2016 Luminosity, who secured Brazil's first Major at MLG Columbus that year.

Should Vitality keep up their streak, they will be looking to rival the historic Astralis lineup of 2018 and 2019 (17 wins), the late 2023 FaZe squad that dominated the beginning of CS2 (18 wins), and the Intel Grand Slam-winning Liquid roster of 2019 (23 wins).

MOUZ and Vitality locking horns yet again

Vitality are now poised to play in their third grand final in a row, with their sights set on bagging a third-consecutive trophy to go alongside it.

Standing in Vitality's way now is MOUZ, who Dan "⁠apEX⁠" Madesclaire and company trounced in the grand final of ESL Pro League Season 21. The scorelines were far closer in the teams' meeting earlier at BLAST Open Lisbon, but another win for Vitality would start to draw comparisons between other one-sided rivalries, such as the one between Astralis and Liquid in 2018.

"We feel confident [against MOUZ]," ropz said after the Spirit game. "Obviously the last match we played here was quite close, and I think we didn't feel as good as we did in previous times.

"We will definitely try to step up, even if we won. We don't want to give them any space; we're here to win."