ESL One Manila talent announced: Twelve well-known figures join the ranks

The ESL One Manila talent has been revealed, less than a month before the event is scheduled to start. Twelve well-known casters, analysts, observers and stats staff will travel to Manila to cover both the group stages and the main event. ESL One Manila will take place between April 22-24, at the Mall of Asia Arena, in Manila, Philippines. Eight teams – three directly invited and five qualified ones – will compete for the $250,000 base prize-pool.

Will “Chobra” Cho, Jake “SirActionSlacks” Kanner, David “Godz” Parker, Ben “Merlini” Wu, Jacob “Maelk” Toft-Anderson, Owen “Odpixel” Davies, Tobi “Tobiwan” Dawson, Austin “Capitalist” Walsh, William “Blitz” Lee, Kevin “Purge” Godec, Jonathan “Pimpmuckl” Liebig, and Ben “Noxville” Steenhuisen have joined the ESL One Manila talent ranks.

ESL One Manila format

• The group stage will be played in a classic GSL format.
• The eight participating teams will be split up into two groups of four.

  In each group, the teams will play best-of-three matches, as shown below:

  Match #1: Team A vs. Team B
  Match #2: Team C vs. Team D
  Winners’ match (WM): Winner of Match #1 vs. winner of Match #2 – winner advances to the Upper Bracket
  Losers’ match (EM): Loser of Match #1 vs. loser of Match #2 – loser drops to the Lower Bracket
  Decider match: Loser of WM vs. winner of EM – winner advances to the Upper Bracket and loser drops to Lower Bracket

• The group stage will determine the seeding for the main event.
• Four teams will be seeded into the main event Upper Brackets, while the remaining four will start the main event in the Lower Brackets.
• No teams will be eliminated in the group stage.
• During the main event, all teams will play a double-elimination bracket.
• Four teams (top two teams of each of the groups) will start the main event in the Upper Bracket.
• Four teams (bottom two teams of each of the groups) will start the main event in the Lower Bracket.
• All the Upper Bracket match-ups will be best-of-three series.
• The first round of the Lower Bracket matches will be best-of-one elimination series. The following rounds will be best-of-three elimination series.
• The Grand Finals will be best-of-five series, with no winners’ advantage.

ESL One Manila teams

ESL One Manila invited teams

• EHOME
• Team Liquid
• Team Secret

ESL One Manila qualified teams

Qualifiers are currently still underway.

• ESL One Manila Americas spot: compLexity Gaming
• ESL One Manila European spot: Team Empire
• ESL One Manila Chinese spot: TBD
• ESL One Manila Filipino spot: Mineski
• ESL One Manila SEA spot: TBD

ESL One Manila tickets

Tickets have gone on sale and are available for prices ranging from $10 for a general admission two-day pass, to $106 for VIP tickets which include free food and drinks, goodie bags, exclusive signing sessions and premium seating in front of the stage.

ESL One Manila



The Mall of Asia Arena in Manila, Philippines will host ESL One Manila © One FC

In December 2015, ESL have officially announced ESL One Manila – the organization’s first Dota 2 tournament to be held in Southeast Asia. ESL One Manila will be organized in collaboration with PLDT Fibr and GameX and is expected to be Southeast Asia’s largest esports event to date. A local Filipino Dota 2 team will be invited to compete alongside some of the best Dota 2 teams in the world for a $250,000 prize pool.

ESL One Manila will take place between April 22-24, at the Mall of Asia Arena, in Manila, Philippines – a rather new, state-of-the-art in-door venue. The arena has only been inaugurated in 2012 and has a seating capacity of 16,000 for sporting events, and a full house capacity of 20,000.

According to ESL’s announcement, the organization’s first venture on the Asian continent will bring ESL to a yearly Dota 2 prize fund milestone of $750,000 – a step closer to their promise of pledging one million dollars in Dota 2 prize money over a twelve-month period.