Team Spirit: The Belgrade Club That Keeps Winning the Impossible
Three Aegis titles, a Counter-Strike Major led by a teenager and an MLBB trophy nobody expected. How a 2015 start-up became one of the most decorated clubs in esports.
In 2021 most Dota fans could not have named five Team Spirit players. By the end of that year, the club's young roster had won $18.2 million at The International, then the largest single prize in esports. Five years later, Spirit has won Dota 2's world title three times, a Counter-Strike Major, and a mobile trophy in a genre it barely played before. Few clubs win this often in games this different.
Spirit closed its Dota summer on August 23, 2026, by beating TEAM VISION 3-2 in Shanghai to become the first team with three TI titles. The same day in Paris, its Counter-Strike team won the Esports World Cup. Here is who they are.
From Moscow to Belgrade
Team Spirit was founded in 2015 and is run by CEO Nikita "Cheshir" Chukalin. In 2022 it moved its headquarters from Moscow to Belgrade, Serbia, a decision the club tied to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
Today Spirit fields teams in Dota 2, Counter-Strike 2, Mobile Legends: Bang Bang, PUBG Mobile and Hearthstone, and in April 2025 it signed chess grandmasters Daniil Dubov and Vladislav Artemiev.
The Yellow Submarine
The 2021 Dota roster, which fans nicknamed the "Yellow Submarine", was Yatoro, TORONTOTOKYO, Collapse, Miposhka and Mira. It came through the Eastern European qualifier, which meant it started TI 2021 in Bucharest with little expectation.
It lost early to Invictus Gaming and dropped to the lower bracket. Then it beat OG, Virtus.pro, Invictus Gaming and Team Secret, and in the final against PSG.LGD it fell 0-2 behind before winning three games in a row. It was the kind of final that turns a roster into a legend.
Two years later, in Seattle in 2023, Spirit swept Gaimin Gladiators 3-0 to become the first repeat champion since OG. In 2026, with Yatoro and Collapse still at the core, mid laner Larl, supports not me and rue, and Miposhka now coaching, it won a third time. We cover that final in our TI 2026 report.
A teenager and a Major
Spirit's Counter-Strike story is built around one player. Danil "donk" Kryshkovets, born in 2007 in Tomsk, came through the club's academy after being scouted in 2021 and joined the main roster in 2023.
At the Perfect World Shanghai Major 2024 in December, Spirit beat FaZe Clan 2-1 in the final to win the club's first Major. The roster was donk, chopper, sh1ro, zont1x and magixx. donk became the youngest Major champion and youngest Major MVP in history, and he was named HLTV's Player of the Year for 2024 at 17. His full story is in our donk profile.
In 2026 the Counter-Strike team kept collecting silverware. It won PGL Astana in May, reached the semifinals of the IEM Cologne Major in June, and on August 23 beat FUT Esports 3-1 at the 20,000-seat Accor Arena to win Counter-Strike at the Esports World Cup in Paris. donk was named MVP of that final.
The trophy nobody expected
The strangest addition to the cabinet came on a phone. At the 2026 MLBB Mid Season Cup, part of the Esports World Cup, Spirit beat Myanmar's Yangon Galacticos 4-3 in a best-of-seven final. It was the club's first Mobile Legends trophy, and Spirit became the first team from outside Asia to win the event, in a game whose fan base is centred on Southeast Asia.
Why it matters
Spirit's habit is winning from behind: the 2021 comeback from 0-2, the 2026 run through the lower bracket, the MLBB final that went seven games. Its recipe is just as consistent. The club develops young players, keeps a core together, and moves former players into coaching rather than starting again.
For neutral fans, that makes Spirit the closest thing Dota has to a modern dynasty and one of the few clubs that can contend in several games at once. Dota 2 and Counter-Strike 2 are both free to play on Steam, so the easiest way to see the fuss is to pull up the 2021 TI final and watch what happens after game two.