M5 World Championship: Blacklist International, See You Soon survive first round of Knockout Stage eliminations

The competition rages on during the third day of the Mobile Legends: Bang Bang (MLBB) M5 World Championship Knockout Stage on Monday (11 December).

In the first battle for survival of the Knockout Stage, four teams faced off and it was the Philippines' Blacklist International and Cambodia's See You Soon emerging triumphant over Turkey's Fire Flux Esports and Myanmar's Burmese Ghouls, respectively.

Here’s how day three of the M5 World Championship Knockout Stage went:

Blacklist International 3-1 Fire Flux Esports

Blacklist International dropped to the lower bracket after losing in a five-game thriller against ONIC Esports in the upper bracket in the opening day of the Knockout Stage.

On the other hand, Fire Flux were defeated by Russian squad Deus Vult, pitting them against a familiar opponent in the first round of the lower bracket. And while Fire Flux managed to defeat Blacklist in their previous encounter during the Group Stage, the Filipino squad won when it counted.

Blacklist opened the series with a dominant 15-minute win, but Fire Flux fired back in game two after another 15-minute encounter.

The Filipino squad, however, took over once again in the third game, where they cornered Fire Flux to win the game in under 17 minutes. Blacklist continued with this momentum, winning the fourth game in 17 minutes to claim the 3-1 victory.

Blacklist’s mid laner Kenneth "Yue" Tadeo and gold laner Kiel "Oheb" Q.Soriano were instrumental in establishing the Filipino team’s dominance throughout the series, with Yue claiming MVP honours in games one and four while Oheb got the nod for game three.

See You Soon 3-0 Burmese Ghouls

See You Soon were dropped to the lower bracket after getting routed by the Philippines' AP.Bren during the second day of the Knockout Stage. Meanwhile, Burmese Ghouls were knocked down by Geek Fam ID after a hard-fought five-game series.

Burmese Ghouls looked exhausted by their previous loss, as they could do little to stop See You Soon from sweeping them out of M5 in three games that each lasted 15 minutes or less.

See You Soon quickly established dominance in the first game by winning in 14 minutes. They continued to accelerate the pace of the game to win the second game in 15 minutes before finally closing the series in a clean sweep after a 13-minute encounter in game 3.

The Cambodian squad’s stars were Filipino jungler Michael "MP the King" Endino, who was MVP for the first game, and Cambodian mid laner Sovann "Raa" Chanmakara, who took MVP honours for games two and three.

With the day’s results, both Blacklist International and See You Soon will continue their lower bracket run in the lower bracket quarterfinals on Friday (15 December). They will be facing the losing team of the upper bracket semifinals matches between AP Bren and Geek Fam ID and Deus Vult and ONIC Esports, respectively.

Meanwhile, both Fire Flux Esportsand Burmese Ghouls end their M5 run in 7th-8th place, taking home US$30,000 in consolation.

The M5 World Championship Knockout Stage will follow a double elimination format with all matches being a best-of-five except for the Grand Finals, which will be a full best-of-seven series.

The Knockout Stage will be held in two phases. The first phase will be held in the EMV Convention Center from 9 to 12 December and includes the upper bracket quarterfinals (9 to 10 December), the first round of the lower bracket (11 December), and the upper bracket semifinals (12 December).

The second phase of the Knockout Stage will be held in the Rizal Memorial Coliseum from 15 to 17 December. It will include the lower bracket quarterfinals (15 December), the lower bracket semifinals and upper bracket finals (16 December), as well as the lower bracket finals and Grand Finals (17 December).

For everything you need to know about the M5 World Championship, check here.

Anna is a freelance writer and photographer. She is a gamer who loves RPGs and platformers, and is a League of Legends geek. She's also a food enthusiast who loves a good cup of black coffee.

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