If IEM Katowice 2025 was only a hint of what was to come, ESL Pro League S21 was a clear proof. Team Vitality, in their current form and with their current roster, will be very hard to beat.
It feels like 2025 will be such a one-sided year for Counter-Strike 2 that at some point, the crowd will start cheering for Vitality’s opponents just for the sake of experiencing something new.
How Vitality Won The Trophy
ESL Pro League S21 had 24 participants. Vitality started in stage 2, so after the first 8 teams were eliminated. During this stage, they defeated MIBR (2 – 1), 3DMAX (2 – 0), and their future Grand Final opponent, MOUZ (2 – 0). The match wasn’t even close: 13 – 6 on Inferno, 13 – 7 on Dust II.
As a former Vitality member, Lotan “Spinx” Giladi probably knew all too well that he was not going to steal Mathieu “ZywOo” Herbaut’s glory.
Last year, the French superstar failed to finish in the top-3 at the individual level for the first time in 6 years. But now that he can rely on Robin “ropz” Kool to create something out of nothing almost every round, 1st place is almost guaranteed.
Vitality’s statistics are terrifying. In 5v4 situations, they win 90% of the time. This means that just one pick-off is sufficient, and they tend to get it quite often.
After advancing to the playoffs with a perfect record, Vitality encountered Team Liquid, The MongolZ, and then MOUZ for a second time.
Liquid played well but lost both maps 13 – 9. The MongolZ were even better and actually managed to win on Vitality’s map pick in overtime. But on the other two maps, they got destroyed: 13 – 4 on Anubis, 13 – 2 on Inferno.
MOUZ didn’t stand a chance in the Grand Final. The scores were 13 – 9 on Dust 2, 13 – 4 on Nuke, and 13 – 5 on Inferno. The best player on the server was, quite surprisingly, William “mezii” Merriman, who finished the match with a score of 42 – 26 and a rating 2.1 of 1.33.
