And so the first season of 2025 has come to an end.

A season that began with Spirit lifting an often forgotten trophy at BLAST Bounty, everything that came after was won by Vitality. A run so strong eclipses even Astralis’ at the height of their powers, we’ll likely never see dominance like it again in the modern era.

One of the big questions heading into next season will be whether or not they can maintain their level for an even longer period of time, or if one of their many chasers will finally catch up.

Chief of those will be Spirit.

The team that we all expect so much more from, their win in Shanghai should have propelled them to new heights. But their stagnant roster has, unsurprisingly, stagnated, and many will now be expecting them to make changes going into the new season.

Another team that actually know will be making changes is Falcons, who are set to bring in kyousuke over the break.

The biggest disappointment in Austin, we have our concerns that kyousuke will create more problems that he fixes, but another change to the team could prevent that and see Falcons become Vitality’s true number one contender.

Two teams we expect to look the same are MOUZ and The MongolZ.

Both were exceptional in the first half of the year, and given how both teams seem to have gotten over their stage fright, it’s only a matter of time before they get to lift one of the biggest trophies in CS.

Of course, there’s also the number of teams that should be far better than they have been this year.

Astralis have now signed HooXi after an impressive stand-in period, while FURIA and FaZe also looked much better with YEKINDAR and s1mple. Whether or not that can be something consistent, or if the latter two will even join permanently is yet to be soon, but they should all go a long way in making their respective teams matter again.

And that also brings us to Liquid, and to NAVI. Two teams, who, without sugarcoating it, have had utterly dreadful first halves of the year.

Both terrible in their own way, changes are a guarantee over the break, but neither team has an obvious answer if they hope to get back to their glory days within CS. makazze could go a long way for NAVI, if they can keep hold of players they’d want to hang on to, but it’s really not looking good for any move Liquid can make.

The same is true for G2, who desperately need to shake off the Snax and TaZ era.

SunPayus and sAw are coming in, and they will make them better, but neither man is enough. There will need to be more changes and more money spent if G2 have any hope of lifting a trophy again.

In short, if you thought the rostermania at the start of the year was crazy, expect this one to get f-cking mental.

Never before have so many teams disappointed in such a way before, never before have many of these players played against a team as so seemingly perfect as Vitality. Questions must be asked by a lot of organisations, and you can be certain they will be.

Whatever happens, though, we’ll be here for it all. Whether a move makes us feel giddy with excitement, utterly confused, or feel absolutely nothing at all, you can be sure that you’ll always – whether you ask for it or not – be getting our opinion on it.

So, with that, another season comes to a close and the only thing left for us to do is thank you, our loyal reader, for always being along for the ride with us.

Bringing you the news, good or bad, is never not a joy to us all, and we look forward to continuing to do so as the new season begins!

Up the TLDR.