Just three days after lifting the Esports World Cup trophy in Paris, Spirit are back to business with a decisive 2-0 victory over DENDELE, 13-8 on Ancient and 13-7 on Cache, in the BLAST Open Porto opening round.
Danil "donk" Kryshkovets became the first player in CS2 to reach 20 aces at HTLV MVP events in the match, separating himself from Mathieu "ZywOo" Herbaut and Nikola "NiKo" Kovač, who have 18 each.
donk did it with two aces on Cache, and one of them came in the first pistol round. What made it even more special was that he dealt 500 damage and took none himself in the round.
At HLTV-caliber events, a player dealing 500 damage and receiving none has only happened three other times. One of those was by his DENDELE rival João "koala" Pfeffer, who dualied his way to a pistol ace holding B apps against TYLOO in the first stage of the IEM Cologne Major.
Danil "molodoy" Golubenko also got one such ace, dealing all of the damage and receiving none, on a Mirage B defense with the AWP against Passion UA at IEM Rio 2026, ending the series with that play.
The other one was by Buğra "Calyx" Arkın at ESL Pro League Season 20 in 2024 against FlyQuest, who tried to rush him on Dust2's B site through a smoke on a half buy.
Spirit's star led the way in the series against DENDELE beyond the aces, topping the board on Ancient with 24 kills, 125.1 ADR, and +7.79% round swing for a 1.97 rating in the 13-8 victory, and followed it up with a 2.34 rating on Cache, where he also had 24 kills along with 133.9 ADR and a +10.94% swing in the 13-7 victory that ended the series.
Spirit will play G2 next in the Group A upper semi-final to fight for a spot at the Super Bock Arena in Porto, while DENDELE will fight for survival against Aurora in the lower bracket.
Danil 'molodoy' GolubenkoPast 3 months
Spirit
Dmitry 'sh1ro' Sokolov
Boris 'magixx' Vorobiev
Andrey 'tN1R' Tatarinovich
Myroslav 'zont1x' Plakhotia
Danil 'donk' Kryshkovets
Sergey 'hally' Shavaev
João 'koala' PfefferPast 3 months
FlyQuest
Justin 'jks' Savage
Joshua 'INS' Potter
Declan 'Vexite' Portelli
Corey 'nettik' Browne
Aaron 'AZR' Ward
TYLOO
Yi 'JamYoung' Yang
Dongkai 'Jee' Ji
Jingxiang 'Mercury' Wang
Qianhao 'Moseyuh' Chen
Su 'Zero' Jingshen
WeiJie 'zhokiNg' Zhong
Mathieu 'ZywOo' HerbautPast 3 months
G2
Nemanja 'huNter-' Kovač
Guy 'NertZ' Iluz
Artem 'r1nkle' Moroz
Nikita 'HeavyGod' Martynenko
Matúš 'MATYS' Šimko
Eetu 'sAw' Saha
Passion UA
DENDELE
Victor 'gafolo' Andrade
João 'koala' Pfeffer
Máximo 'maxxkor' Cortina
Daniel 'rdnzao' Monteiro
Danilo 'doc' Barros
Hélder 'coachi' Sancho
Aurora
Ismailcan 'XANTARES' Dörtkardeş
Özgür 'woxic' Eker
Jimi 'Jimpphat' Salo
Damjan 'kyxsan' Stoilkovski
Ali 'Wicadia' Haydar Yalçın
Ashley 'ash' Battye
Nikola 'NiKo' KovačPast 3 months
Buğra 'Calyx' ArkınPast 3 months
Danil 'donk' KryshkovetsPast 3 months