Team Spirit announces the early return of their star player, Illya “Yatoro” Mulyarchuk. The news came as an unexpected yet pleasant surprise for Team Spirit fans since it was only two months ago when the esports organization announced three of their players were going inactive.
Offlane player, Magomed “Collapse” Khalilov, and coach, Airat “Silent” Gaziev, have also returned to the active roster accordingly.
Illya “Yatoro” Mulyarchuk (Image credit: The International 2023)
Yatoro’s return
According to Team Spirit’s team manager, Dmitry “Korb3n” Belov, Illya’s return was an unexpected one but it happened. Nevertheless, the team is more than happy to accommodate the change for their star player.
Yatoro is a legendary player, who needs no introduction, having won two Internationals Championships for Team Spirit. Additionally, he’s often considered one of the best Dota 2 players in history – at least out of more recent players.
Yatoro, Collapse and Silent returns to Team Spirit (Image credit: Team Spirit)
What happens to Satanic?
Unfortunately, this also means the highly-anticipated new player, Alan “Satanic” Gallyamov, will have to take a step out of Team Spirit’s active roster.
Since Yatoro will be playing the hard carry role, Satanic is now just a substitute. Nevertheless, manager Korb3n expressed Satanic’s departure is a heartbreaking move since the young prodigy has a lot of potential.
Team Spirit successfully placed third at DreamLeague Season 24 with Satanic on the forefront, so he certainly does live up to his name despite being a young player.
Message from Dmitry “Korb3n” Belov (Image credit: Team Spirit)
Team Spirit’s 2025 Dota 2 Roster
Meanwhile, the other founding member of this Team Spirit line-up, Myroslav “Mira” Kolpakov, is still inactive. Hence, the new replacement, Aleksandr “rue” Filin, will continue to fill his role as pos-4 support player.
This finalizes Team Spirit’s Dota 2 roster for the 2025 season at the time of writing:
- Illya “Yatoro” Mulyarchuk
- Denis “Larl” Sigitov
- Magomed “Collapse” Khalilov
- Aleksandr “rue” Filin
- Yaroslav “Miposhka” Naidenov
Thought on Team Spirit going into 2025
Recapping on Team Spirit’s previous season, the two-time champions have been underwhelming to say the least. They were able to participate in most major tournaments, such as the Riyadh Masters, ESL One Birmingham 2024, Elite League, and BetBoom Dacha Dubai 2024. However, results were mediocre, especially coming from the expectations of a TI-winning squad.
With Yatoro’s return going into 2025 season, all that’s changed was Mira’s departure for rue on the support role. This is not an optimistic look on Team Spirit, considering they have really struggled to compete against the newer competitors, such as Team Falcons, Team Liquid, Gaimin Gladiators and even BetBoom Team.
It would be interesting to see what changes Team Spirit will bring to the table at upcoming Dota 2 tournaments.