MOBILE LEGENDS

Reigning champion Blacklist International, Echo begin M4 campaigns

As the new year begins, Blacklist International and Echo will also look to open their respective Mobile Legends: Bang Bang M4 World Championship campaign on the right foot in a bid to maintain the Philippines' tag as a powerhouse MLBB country.

M3 champion Blacklist will open its title defense bid right at the beginning of 2023, opening hostilities against Turkey's Incendio Supremacy in Group A on January 1 at 3 p.m. before taking on both Burn x Flash of Cambodia and Falcon Esports of Myanmar on January 3 at 6 and 8 p.m., respectively.

Blacklist, the MPL Season 10 champions, will banner a familiar roster headlined by the duo of  Johnmar "OhMyV33nus" Villaluna and Danerie James "Wise" Del Rosario alongside the trio of Edward Jay "Edward" Dapadap, Salic "Hadji" Imam, and Kiel "OHEB" Soriano.

Meanwhile, Echo will also look to get off to a flying start as it tackles top-tier Indonesian team RRQ Hoshi on January 2. Echo will then play Middle East's Occupy Thrones and Singapore's RSG SG on January 4 to conclude its group stage campaign.

The group stage will be played in a best-of-one and single round-robin format with the top two teams from each of the four groups qualifying to the upper bracket while the bottom two teams will be placed in the lower bracket.

There will be no elimination during the group stage. The playoff stage will be from January 7 to 14 while the grand finals is scheduled on January 15.

—MGP, GMA Integrated News