Spirit have recently gone through a turbulent period. They lost in the BLAST Bounty grand final and suffered a shock first-round defeat to JijeHao at the EWC. After beating Luminosity in the group stage, donk admitted that the team is currently in an unstable state and shared how he thinks the squad should get back on track.
donk: "I think we've already played the way we wanted to, but our individual performances really weren't good enough, and that's our biggest problem right now. What we need to do now is play as many matches as possible to get back to our previous form through matches. We didn't play well at BLAST Bounty, but that was only the first event of the new season after all, and I think everyone is still in the adjustment period."
donk emphasized that the team needs to improve its performance by playing a large number of matches. He even believes that losing the first group stage match is not necessarily a bad thing — that way they can play one extra match before the playoffs, using matches as training.
donk: “If we make it to the playoffs, we'll definitely be in better form than we are now in the group stage. Good form has to be earned through matches in the tournament, not through practice outside of it. We just need games, to keep playing games. Maybe losing the first match is actually a good thing, because playing an extra match could be good for us.”
After losing to JiJieHao in the opening round of the EWC group stage, Spirit defeated Luminosity in the lower bracket. Although they won, it was far from easy — the second map, Dust2, went to double overtime before they narrowly secured the win.
donk: “When it went to overtime, I knew this match would not be easy, and it also shows that our current situation is indeed very difficult. Actually, this was expected. After losing to JiJieHao yesterday, the team was indeed not in its best form. All we can do is face reality and keep playing.”
Spirit had been without head coach hally's on-site guidance for the past several tournaments, but the Russian coach has now returned to the team. However, donk revealed that the team hasn't felt much change from his return.
donk: “I don't think there's much difference, because we played well even when he wasn't here before, and now that he's back, he doesn't want to disrupt the current rhythm. He lets us keep playing the way we did without him. We've already formed our own system, and he gives us a lot of freedom.”