ECHO Proud wins inaugural Mobile Legends Development League tilt

ECHO Proud on Sunday made history, copping the inaugural Mobile Legends: Bang Bang Development League - Philippines (MDL-PH) after trouncing GameLab, 3-1, in their best-of-five finals series held online over the weekend.

ECHO Proud, which serves as M4 champions Echo's developmental league squad, will take home USD20,000 or approximately PHP1,080,000.

Veteran roamer Jay Pee "Jaypee" Gonzalez was declared as the Grand Finals Most Valuable Player (MVP) with his masterful use of Franco in Game 2 and Chou in the title-clinching Game 4.

Game Lab settled for silver while Blacklist Academy and BREN Euphoria finished  third and fourth, respectively.

"Sobrang saya sa feeling namin. Gusto talaga namin makuha ang championship sa first season ng MDL Philippines kasi mahirap siyang makalimutan. First MDL sa Pilipinas at kami ang nanalo," said Jaypee during the MDL Philippines grand finals press conference.

("It's such a happy feeling for us. We really wanted to win the championship in the first season of MDL Philippines because it will be hard to forget. First MDL in the Philippines, and we won it.")

ECHO Proud is headed by its coach Limuelle "eLLE" Galera as the team paraded strong esports athletes namely Johnville "Outplayed" Villar, Jankurt "KurtTzy" Seralvo, James "Jeymz" Gloria, Amistoso "Seichu" Lope, and Jaypee.

—Bea Micaller/JMB, GMA Integrated News