Why Spirit are the new favourites to win the IEM Cologne 2026 Major
For a year and a half, Vitality have been the favourites for almost every event they have attended. Even when their light dimmed slightly in the wake of late-2025 FURIA, they were never counted out, but now a new contender may have just overtaken them.
That new contender, Team Spirit, is a known quantity to Vitality. Or they used to be. The reigning Major champions defeated Spirit 3-0 the last time they faced off in the final of IEM Rio, but that was two months ago and a lot has changed since then, and Spirit’s record-breaking Swiss run in Stage 2 of the IEM Cologne Major might have just announced them as the new big favourites to take the whole event.
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The kings of Swiss
Spirit aren’t just good at Swiss stages, they’re the undisputed kings of it. When Vitality slipped up in their BO1 against Legacy last year in Austin, Spirit were already laughing, halfway through a streak that would see them (up until the time of writing) win an incredible 27 matches in a row in Swiss stages.
A run that stretches back to the Perfect World Shanghai Major, where they lost their opener against G2 before advancing with a 3-1 record, they’ve just enjoyed their most dominant Swiss stage yet in Stage 2 of the Cologne Major.
Sure, that run did come against some lower level opposition in BetBoom, MIBR, and 9z, but none of these teams are to be laughed at. Each of them have been on a strong run of form coming into the first Major of the year.
Spirit’s record against these teams is also nothing to laugh at. donk and co. played 62 rounds across their four maps in Stage 2, winning 52 of them. 52. For those who are bad at maths, that means they lost only ten.
donk’s firing on all cylinders
The scariest part, though, isn’t the round win percentage. It’s what donk was doing in those rounds.
We all know how good donk is, but 2024’s Player of the Year ascended during Stage 2 in Cologne. He ended those four maps with an untouchable 2.27 rating, with his highest-rated map coming in at 2.76 against 9z on Nuke, and his lowest being a rather measly by comparison 1.76 against MIBR on Mirage.
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It’s not just the ratings that are insane. Every stat is. 91.9% KAST. 138 ADR. 1.48 KPR. 41.9% of rounds ending in a multi-kill. His opening duels? That wonderful metric that measures the effectiveness of donk’s devastating playstyle? 83.3% success rate when taking 27.3% of his team’s T side openers.
donk alone at the top of the scoreboard is something we’ve all grown accustomed to. It’s basically just the expected result at this point, but where donk’s isolation on the Spirit scoreboard was formerly down to his team letting him down, in Cologne, he wasn’t even giving them the opportunity to.
Spirit unleashed
That said, even if donk had let off the gas at all, we doubt it would have mattered too much. tN1R and sh1ro ended Stage 2 on 1.45 and 1.33 ratings respectively, and zont1x also reinforced them with a solid 1.15 rating of his own.
This is a Spirit who have been unleashed in recent months, who have developed their playstyle in the absence of hally, and are now revelling in those developments. tN1R finally looks like the player Spirit brought in from HEROIC, and sh1ro is getting his mojo back after a rather underwhelming start to 2026.
It’s this version of Spirit that should terrify everyone in CS, including Vitality. This isn’t the same Spirit they faced just two months ago in Rio, it’s an evolved form that first bared its fangs at PGL Astana, and has now chewed through opposition in the Major, too.
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Vitality, through all their dominance, have never faced a team quite like this Spirit. Teams may have gotten the upperhand over them at points, but those teams’ successes always felt fleeting, flashes in pans brought on by purple patches or just a bad day for Vitality.
Not this Spirit, though. This Spirit is a deadly, unforgiving force. It features a donk that will make you regret ever joining the server, a tN1R that will happily punish the gaps created by donk, and a sh1ro that will tie the round up with a calmness that has no right existing in the chaos his teammates have created.
This is a Spirit that outstrips the teams that won IEM Katowice 2024, the Perfect World Shanghai Major 2024, and IEM Cologne 2025. This is a Spirit that’s ready to win another Major.
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