The playoffs at BLAST Open Porto have produced the final most of the Counter-Strike betting scene had circled from the start: Spirit against MOUZ, Sunday at 16:00 CEST in the Porto arena. Both sides swept their semi-finals on Saturday, and both arrive with a very recent history against each other – MOUZ beat Spirit 3-1 in the BLAST Bounty Season 2 grand final in Malta only weeks ago.
Spirit stretch their Ancient streak to 14
Spirit opened the day by dismantling Falcons 2-0. Nuke, the Falcons pick, was effectively over after a flawless CT half from Spirit; karrigan’s 1v2 in the final round of the half was the only thing that stopped a 12-0 scoreline. Falcons rallied with seven straight rounds after the switch to make it 11-8, but Spirit closed out 13-8.
Ancient was the tighter map. Falcons led 6-3 midway through the first half before donk’s USP triple put Spirit ahead for the first time, and the map went to a 24th round after TeSeS and karrigan dragged Falcons back into it. The decisive moment came when m0NESY, in a 1v4 after a broken A hit, killed three defenders and planted – only for magixx to deny the clutch from Donut. 13-11 to Spirit, their 14th straight win on Ancient, and a third consecutive grand final after Malta and the Esports World Cup title in Paris. sh1ro topped the series with a 1.21 rating.
MOUZ finally break the Vitality hoodoo
The second semi-final looked like a formality on paper. MOUZ went in with a 2-12 head-to-head record against Vitality dating back roughly 18 months, their last win coming in the IEM Chengdu groups ten months ago. Instead, xertioN’s squad won 2-0 on Dust2 (13-11) and Mirage (13-7).
Vitality, still fielding jL as a stand-in, were targeted relentlessly on the Lithuanian’s positions. On Dust2, MOUZ raced to 4-0, fell behind 10-8 after ZywOo woke up, then went back to repeated B hits to close it 13-11. On Mirage, Vitality led 4-0 before two smoke pushes swung the momentum; MOUZ took a 7-5 half and never let go, with a Spinx triple on a light buy killing Vitality’s last comeback attempt. It is MOUZ’s second grand final of the season after their Bounty win – both against Spirit.
What the numbers say for Sunday
The bookmakers offering CS2 markets have Spirit as narrow favourites, which makes sense given a title run in Paris and the Ancient record. But MOUZ hold the most recent head-to-head and have now beaten Vitality and Spirit inside one month. A best-of-five with map veto dynamics – can MOUZ avoid Ancient? – makes this a live match rather than a formality.
For anyone looking to have a stake on the final, several sportsbooks are running esports welcome offers that can be used on BLAST markets. Be careful with map handicaps: both teams have looked far stronger on their own picks this week than on their opponents’.
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