Sie wirkt ruhig, doch innerlich spürt sie die Enttäuschung über das Ergebnis.

wirkt comes from wirken and here means “to appear / to come across (as)”.

• Sie wirkt ruhig = She appears calm / She comes across as calm
• Sie ist ruhig = She is calm (states it as a fact)
• Sie scheint ruhig (zu sein) = She seems to be calm (more tentative, based on impressions)

wirken is often used for the impression someone or something makes on others, and it’s a bit more neutral and common in everyday speech than scheinen in this kind of sentence.

After verbs like sein, werden, bleiben, wirken, aussehen, adjectives are used as predicate adjectives and appear in their basic form (no endings):

• Sie ist ruhig. – She is calm.
• Sie wirkt ruhig. – She appears calm.
• Er bleibt freundlich. – He remains friendly.
• Das klingt seltsam. – That sounds strange.

Endings (like -e, -er, -en) are used when adjectives stand before nouns:

• eine ruhige Person – a calm person
• ein freundlicher Mann – a friendly man

Here ruhig describes sie, but it comes after the verb and is therefore used without an ending.

In this sentence, doch is a coordinating conjunction meaning roughly “but / yet / however”:

• Sie wirkt ruhig, doch innerlich spürt sie die Enttäuschung …
  = She appears calm, yet inside she feels the disappointment …

Differences to aber:

• Grammatically, in this position, doch and aber are very similar; you could also say:
  Sie wirkt ruhig, aber innerlich spürt sie …
• Stylistically, doch can feel slightly more literary or emphatic, stressing the contrast between outward calm and inner disappointment.
• In spoken German, aber is more frequent; doch adds a nuance of “in spite of that / contrary to what you might think”.

So doch highlights the contrast: outward impression vs inner reality.

Both are grammatically possible, but the word order changes the emphasis:

1. doch innerlich spürt sie die Enttäuschung …

   • After the conjunction doch (position 0), innerlich is in position 1, so the verb spürt must come in position 2 (German V2 rule).
   • This puts focus on innerlich (= internally, on the inside).
   • Implies: Outwardly she seems calm, but *inside she feels the disappointment.*

2. doch sie spürt innerlich die Enttäuschung …

   • Here sie is in position 1, spürt in position 2, and innerlich is later in the sentence.
   • The emphasis is more on she (as opposed to someone else), and innerlich is less highlighted.

The given version makes the contrast between outer appearance and inner state more explicit.

In this sentence, innerlich functions as an adverb modifying the verb spürt:

• innerlich spürt sie … = she feels (it) inwardly / internally / on the inside (emotionally)

Meaning-wise, innerlich here refers to:

• emotional / mental state, not physical sensations visible from outside.

As an adjective, innerlich can describe nouns:

• ein innerlicher Konflikt – an inner conflict
• innere Spannung (more common)

Alternative expressions with a similar idea:

• doch in ihrem Inneren spürt sie …
• doch tief in sich drin spürt sie …

doch is used here as a coordinating conjunction joining two main clauses:

1. Sie wirkt ruhig
2. innerlich spürt sie die Enttäuschung über das Ergebnis

In German, you must put a comma between two clauses of this type:

• [Hauptsatz], doch [Hauptsatz].
• [Hauptsatz], aber [Hauptsatz].
• [Hauptsatz], und [Hauptsatz]. (comma optional in some cases, but common in writing)

So the comma is there because it separates two independent clauses connected by doch.

All three can involve sensations or feelings, but with different nuances:

• spüren – to sense, to feel (often more physical or subtle, like a sensation)
  
  • Sie spürt die Enttäuschung. – She senses/feels the disappointment (as something clearly present inside her).
• fühlen – to feel (emotionally or physically, often more direct and emotional)
  
  • Sie fühlt Enttäuschung. – She feels disappointment.
• merken – to notice, to realize
  
  • Sie merkt die Enttäuschung. – She notices the disappointment (e.g. in herself or others).

In this sentence, spürt suggests an inner sensation that she is aware of – the disappointment is palpable to her. fühlt would also be possible, but spürt sounds slightly more like she is sensing an inner pressure/weight.

In German, abstract nouns like Enttäuschung (disappointment) usually take an article in contexts where English might omit it:

• English: She feels disappointment about the result.
• German: Sie spürt die Enttäuschung über das Ergebnis.

Here die Enttäuschung can imply:

• a specific disappointment (the one caused by this result)
• or just disappointment in general, but as a concrete inner “thing” she feels.

German allows article-less use in some fixed phrases, but in a normal sentence like this, the article is standard and sounds much more natural.

The preposition über can govern Akkusativ or Dativ, but:

• with literal meanings of “above, over” in a static position → usually Dativ
  
  • über dem Tisch – above the table
• with movement or figurative/abstract meanings like about, concerning → usually Akkusativ

With Enttäuschung, über is used in the sense of “about / because of / regarding”, so it takes the accusative:

• die Enttäuschung über das Ergebnis – the disappointment about the result
  (das Ergebnis is accusative here)

That’s why it is das Ergebnis, not dem Ergebnis.

Yes, you can say:

• die Enttäuschung über das Ergebnis
• die Enttäuschung wegen des Ergebnisses

Both are correct, but with a nuance:

• über
  • Akkusativ (über das Ergebnis)
    
    • a bit more neutral; very common with words like Freude über, Ärger über, Enttäuschung über
• wegen
  • Genitiv (wegen des Ergebnisses; often Dativ in speech: wegen dem Ergebnis)
    
    • literally “because of”; slightly stronger causal focus: this result is the cause of the disappointment.

In many contexts, they can be used interchangeably, but “Enttäuschung über das Ergebnis” is a very natural standard collocation.

Because it is the object of the preposition über in the phrase:

• die Enttäuschung über das Ergebnis

Here, über is used in a figurative sense (about, regarding) and governs the accusative case. Since Ergebnis is a neuter noun:

• Nominative: das Ergebnis
• Accusative: das Ergebnis
• Dative: dem Ergebnis
• Genitive: des Ergebnisses

The form happens to be the same in nominative and accusative, but in this structure it’s accusative because of über.

In isolation, sie could theoretically be:

• she (3rd person singular, feminine)
• they (3rd person plural)
• Sie (capitalized) = you (formal)

Here, we have:

• Sie wirkt ruhig, doch innerlich spürt sie …

Because the second sie is not capitalized, we know:

• It must be she (3rd person singular, feminine).

Also, the verb forms (wirkt, spürt) fit 3rd person singular. If it meant you (formal), the second one would have to be Sie with a capital S. For they, we would normally see some plural marking in the context.

Both wirkt and spürt are in the:

• present tense (Präsens)
• indicative mood (Indikativ)

German Präsens is often translated with simple present in English:

• Sie wirkt ruhig – She appears calm.
• sie spürt die Enttäuschung – she feels the disappointment.

Depending on context, you might also translate it with present progressive if you want to stress ongoing action:

• She is appearing calm, yet inside she is feeling the disappointment…

But grammatically in German, it’s just the normal present tense.