Read what Dota 2 and The International are and why so many Russians are there this year Here.
What you need to know about Team Spirit
Team Spirit is a Russian esports organization that originally moved to Belgrade in 2022. The team has representatives from many gaming disciplines at once (in particular, Counter-Strike, Hearthstone, LoL), but its best results are in Dota 2. In 2021 the “dragons” (the club’s nickname) have already become champions of The. Internationally, he later won several more major tournaments. Team Spirit’s five players are three Russians (Yaroslav Miposhka Naydenov, Denis Larl Sigitov and Magomed Collapse Khalilov) and two Ukrainians (Miroslav Mira Kolpakov and Ilya Yatoro Mulyarchuk).
Why is Team Spirit’s victory so great?
Following yesterday’s victory, the Spirits became the second team in Dota history to win two International titles – previously only European club OG, who won the tournament in 2018 and 2019, had achieved such a result.
It is also important how exactly Team Spirit won the cup: perhaps in the 12 years that the Dota 2 World Championship has been held, no one has done it so confidently and without alternatives for their opponents. The “Dragons” finished the tournament, winning all matches with a total score of 19-2 and even closed the final 3-0 against the strongest team of the season, Gaimin Gladiators. Team Spirit was far above all competitors, both as a team and individually; The absolute MVP of the tournament was the “soul” bearer Yatoro – the Dota community now unanimously calls Ilya the best player in his position.
In the season that ended, his teammate Larl went on a journey worthy of a dramatic film adaptation. Denis joined the team at the end of last year (he was the only one not part of the winning team at The International 2021) and was subjected to crushing criticism every time the team failed, regardless of the quality of his performance. his own game (the “Be careful, Larl is playing” meme has been regularly discussed for months regarding any defeat of the “spirits”), but he continued to work hard on himself and got into crazy shape over the summer months. He eventually became the main discovery of the tournament and also the most important element of the champion team. It is even more poignant that Denis is the man entrusted by his partners to be the first to lift the aegis, the trophy awarded to the winners of The International.
How much did Team Spirit get for winning?
This year, the prize fund of the Dota World Championship was only $ 3.1 million, for comparison, at The International 2021, which Spiritualists also won, it was $ 40 million (this is still a record in the entire history of eSports). Moreover, such a sharp decline is not a result of declining interest in professional Dota 2; only game developer and tournament organizer Valve has recently officially announced its desire to devote much less time and funding to competitive Dota. For the sake of developing and improving Dota » amateur (played by ordinary users).
Thus, starting from this year, Dota 2 has become a kind of analogue of the International Olympics, compared, for example, with hockey – this is still the most prestigious tournament in the discipline, but now it is far from the first. Terms of the prize fund.
In this context, the main event of the next season should be the eSports World Championship announced by Saudi Arabia; There they promise that a record prize fund will be awarded by a certain margin.
Team Spirit earned $1.4 million by winning The International 2023 (+ an unspecified amount from Russian porn actress Eva Elfi – who has promised to transfer to the winners all the income from OnlyFans she will receive in the final days of the World Cup). A few months ago, the “dragons” also became the winners of the Riyadh Masters 2023 (hosted by representatives of Saudi Arabia), the strongest tournament of the season in terms of prize fund. They earned $5 million there.
Results of Russian teams at The International
The last World Championship was a real victory for the CIS region and especially the Russian Dota scene. At The International, 19 players from Russia (a tournament record) and four of our teams performed simultaneously (this has never happened before), all of them made it to the play-offs (also an unprecedented event), all three of them took part in the final took. the final stage (yes, you guessed it).
Even Team Spirit’s opponent in the decisive match was a team whose roster included a Russian player: Anton Dyrachyo Shkredov, who during the season became one of the most famous and beloved by fans of domestic dota players.
The main discovery of the tournament among the CIS teams (if we remove Team Spirit from the equation) was Virtus.pro – the team went to Seattle as an outsider, but they eventually managed to top the 8th edition of the International.
By the way, Team Spirit played the most difficult match of the entire tournament against Virtus.pro – during the match the “dragons” were one step away from defeat.
It’s not that the other two teams from the CIS – BB and 9Pandas – failed at The International, but it is difficult to call their performances directly successful. The Pandas, who had internal problems at the end of the season, were unluckily eliminated shortly after the start of the play-offs and finished 9-12. took the top spot and BB once again lost to itself by failing to realize the potential of its top team. It is struggling to get into the top four.
But given the victory of Team Spirit, the CIS region in Dota is now considered by absolutely everyone to be the strongest region in the world – this has never happened throughout the history of computer games.