CHRISTMAS AND NEW YEAR for Blacklist International wasn’t a time for celebration, but a time for intense preparation.
After suffering a defeat against Indonesia’s IESF roster last December, the team knew momentum was against them as they prepared for their M series title defense. With concerns raised by fans and observers, the team immediately went back to the drawing board, preparing for upcoming M4 World Championship.
And as the new year was about to begin, the team uploaded photos and stories of themselves spending the holidays with other teams and players.
After all, for captain Johnmar “OhMyV33nus” Villaluna, making sacrifices is part of their job.
“Siguro sa akin, it’s all about passion talaga e. If you dream to become a world champion, if you have a bigger goal, you need to have a bigger sacrifice,” she said.
Meanwhile, Danerie James “Wise” Del Rosario said that his family understands his current situation.
“It’s about the mindset because if I experienced the holiday in the PH, we won’t have M4. But right now, we have M4 so we didn’t have a chance to celebrate in the Philippines, so my family will understand that. We will see next year.”
Blacklist prepares against the unknown
Being one of the powerhouses in the scene as well as the defending champions, the pressure for Blacklist to win remains high. Teams in M4 are certainly eager to bring them down.
Historically, Blacklist has struggled against enigma teams like BTK and Maharlika Esports, but for Coach Kristoffer “BON CHAN” Ricaplaza, the challenge of facing these teams across other regions is something that he relishes.
“That’s the beauty of facing teams from different regions, from different parts of the world, because you don’t know what kind of gameplay that they’re going to show and you’ll learn something from them if you beat them," he said. "And that’s the beauty of facing different regions.”
He added: “Some regions have aggressive gameplay, while some regions have defensive gameplay. Some will show some cheese strat, and you will know what will happen until you face them.”
The limited data on teams from less popular Mobile Legends regions can pose a challenge, and BON CHAN can only adapt from there.
They showed off their adaptability in their dominant win against Turkish squad Incendio Supremacy.
“We only have a few samples and we just relied on that," explained BON CHAN. "We set our strategy especially on that team to be more aggressive than them. So that’s what we did.”
Aniel “Master The Basics” Jiandani added: “We will still do what we always do. Everything has different strategies so we have to prepare for each team, depending on how they play.”