Donk bounces back from horror opener to see off MOUZ and book Shanghai Major final ticket

Team Spirit proved it takes a team effort to reach a grand final of a major with the Russian squad overcoming a tough opener from Danil "donk" Kryshkovets to defeat MOUZ 2-1 (7-13, 13-4, 13-7) in the first Shanghai Major semifinal.

Donk was all but asleep for Nuke and MOUZ capitalized, but Dmitry "sh1ro" Sokolov and the team stepped up in his absence to survive a hard-fought semifinal. Now, the Russian team is one best-of-three away from major glory, while MOUZ will be lamenting on a series and wider season.

After a few technical issues, MOUZ got to work, breaking Spirit after a lost pistol and racking up the T side rounds with ease. Donk, given every bit of support, simply couldn't find an opening frag, and Spirit crumbled with him in the Shanghai Major semifinal opener.

He finished the map 6-17, a 0.36 rating — his second-worst performance of his career — while MOUZ marched on to claim Nuke 13-7 and set up for a 2-0 wipeout. However, Spirit coach Sergey "hally" Shavayev worked his magic in the break, and a revitalized Spirit emerged on Ancient.

Donk found his mojo again, and as Boris "magixx" Vorobiev explained post-match, the mentality of the squad switched with it. "From our side, it's a game of mind: we were not ourselves on the first map, losing a lot of entry duels, and reacting very slow," he said.

"When we came into Ancient, we knew they weren't confident on the map. It was all about getting a reset after the first map. The fashion in which we lost Nuke was terrifying a bit. We had to forget that and improve our mentality going into the second."

It wasn't just Donk's resurgence, either. Magixx himself stepped up and together the riflers hit MOUZ where it hurt. Despite a few clutch rounds from Jimi "Jimpphat" Salo, Spirit marched on to Mirage with a devastating 13-4 win.

Mirage went back and forward between the two teams in the opening half. But, with the T side pistol in hand, Spirit took full control. Behind a re-awoken Donk the Russian outfit grabbed the semifinal and wouldn't let go.

"Heading onto T side we had our game plan. Once you win the pistol in MR12, it's pretty much done. They're the ones under pressure [economically]," magixx said of the series decider, which Spirit ended up closing out 13-7 thanks to Donk's 19-kill performance. Sh1ro also chimed in, finishing the series on top of the server.

MOUZ looked inconsolable after the defeat, and captain Kamil "siuhy" Szkaradek didn't mince words after the match. "It's very disappointing right now. It felt we had a lot under control after the first map, but it wasn't. We've been practicing [Ancient] a lot for this major and it wasn't enough," he said.

"I think we had a good start to Mirage. There were a lot of close rounds in the beginning that went both ways. It was a balanced first half. Going into the second, they came in with momentum and we couldn't stop them. We didn't play like we normally did. We could have played more aggressively. We didn't show up to our potential."

This was one of MOUZ's best years as an organization since their inception over a decade ago — then as mousesports. Then, 2024 included back-to-back offline wins at ESL Pro League Season 19 and BetBoom Dacha Belgrade, as well as numerous top four finishes at EWC, IEM Katowice, and IEM Cologne.

However, the disappointment of today's loss had already sunk in. "I would say disappointment still, despite the semifinal. — Given the amount of effort we put in these past months and weeks we were definitely aiming to win this major," he said.

The future of the MOUZ lineup is unknown. Other tier-one squads are almost certainly making moves, and siuhy's "no comment" response to the question of whether the team would stick together into 2025 tells quite the story.

While MOUZ's time in Shanghai has ended, Spirit march on to their first major grand final tomorrow. They'll meet the winner of the second semifinal between FaZe and G2.

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