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To the surprise of few fans, Team Spirit has made its way to the PGL Astana finals but it’s met by a surprising challenger in Astralis.
MOUZ, Team Vitality, and Team Falcons all passed on competing in PGL Astana. That offered Team Spirit a clean shot at the finals of the event. The only question was whether Aurora Gaming, The MongolZ, or NaVi would be meeting them.
Astralis threw a wrench in that by beating both NaVi and Aurora in the playoffs, a long-awaited return to the top for the organization. But do they have any chance of taking home the gold?
SEMI-FINALS! Aurora vs Astralis – HIGHLIGHTS – PGL Astana 2025 | CS2
Team Spirit and Astralis will play in a best-of-five match to decide the winner of PGL Astana. The grand final match will take place on May 18, 2025. The first-place prize for the tournament is $200,000 while second place gets $93,750.
Astralis reached its first grand finals to a prominent LAN tournament since 2019, and its first finals to any league or tournament since 2023. This coincides with the addition of Rasmus “HooXi” Nielsen to the roster, who joined replacing Casper “cadiaN” Møller. While HooXi has been off to a good start, the real star for Astralis has been Martin “stavn” Lund, who is one of the top-rated players of the tournament.
That said, when it comes to ratings, all discussions start with Danil “donk” Kryshkovets. The Team Spirit star has been the best player in PGL Astana and is likely to continue that against Astralis.
The favorites to win PGL Astana cruised through the group stage in just six maps and have looked strong in the playoffs, too. The only blemish on the team’s record has been a map loss to Furia in the semifinals.
Team Spirit has kept its roster steady for a long while now since 2023, and that’s paid off with the team winning plenty of big tournaments along the way:
Team Spirit might not be the top-ranked team in the world anymore, but the team still has a good record across all the maps it plays on. Dust 2 is its clear-cut best map, but the team is also off to a strong 5-1 start on Train. That said, Spirit bans Inferno.
Astralis has been impressive in PGL Astana, making a quick trek through the group stage and making its way to its first tournament finals since 2023. It enjoyed a 3-1 group stage run and then defeated NaVi and Aurora Gaming to make its way to the finals.
Astralis added former G2 Esports IGL Rasmus “HooXi” Nielsen to its roster ahead of PGL Astana:
Astralis has a win rate above 60% on Inferno, Ancient, Train, and Nuke in 2025, though that “above” isn’t particularly much. While a winning record on four maps is good, the team is steeply below .500 on Mirage and Dust 2. Astralis also typically bans Anubis.
SEMI-FINALS! FURIA vs Spirit – HIGHLIGHTS – PGL Astana 2025 | CS2
Team Spirit and Astralis have maintained generally steady rosters for some time, and those rosters have crossed paths five times in CS2 history. Astralis has lost each one of those encounters, with the most recent coming earlier in PGL Astana, which ended in a 2-0 defeat for the Danes.
Astralis is a big betting underdog against Team Spirit once again. The moneylines are 5.43 against 1.13. Betting sites are actually showing much more respect to Astralis in this match than they did in the group stage, but the team isn’t being given much of a chance regardless.
Team Spirit should be able to defeat Astralis with little trouble. The exact scoreline is something of a pick’em, but there’s little doubt that the Russian side will win. Still, a grand finals berth is a big win for Astralis regardless.
Think you know who will win? Place your bets here!
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