Team captain of the Esports Association of Brunei (ESB) Muhd Safwan Hakimi said their target this year is to surpass the achievement from last year’s second place and win a gold medal after a heartbreaking loss in the final map to Kazakhstan.
ESB sent a team comprising six athletes and one official for the International Esports Federation (IESF) World Esports Championship for the second time. The team left for Romania yesterday from the Brunei International Airport.
The annual championship is hosted in the city of Iasi, Romania organised by the IESF to pit the best national teams against each other for the title as world champions. The tournament is held from August 24 to September 3 at the Palace of Culture.
Silver medalist PUBG Mobile team from last year’s world championship in Bali, Indonesia aims to finish in the podium once again.
“Our biggest rival will be Kazakhstan and also Mongolia who look very strong from their recent success in regional competitions. We will not underestimate all the other teams that managed to qualify for this World Championship as every team has its own strength. We need to focus on our own game-play and advantage,” he added.
“We have been training hard these few months by analysing our own game-play and fixing our weaknesses and at the same time studying how the other teams are playing so that we can use it to our advantage,” said the team captain.
ESB General Secretary Hawaii Yee said, “We believe that our team is good enough to finish on the podium but the athletes need to believe in themselves and be confident of their own skills. They have shown dedication in their training these few months and hopefully during the competition they can make it count.
“I would like to express our appreciation and gratitude to our sponsors and the Youth and Sports Department at the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sports for their support by providing the facilities and documents to ensure the athletes can attend this world championship. I hope they can use this motivation to perform at the competition,” he added.
The athletes will also compete in Tekken 7 represented by Muhd Hafiy Mirza bin Haji Mohd Shafiee and eFootball 2023 represented by Muhd Abdul Qawiy Wafiyuddin bin Haji Zulaihee.
Muhd Hafiy Mirza aims to improve his personal best from last year’s results, while Muhd Abdul Qawiy Wafiyuddin hopes to qualify in the knockout round after being eliminated in the group stages previously.
“All the other athletes competing are very experienced and have competed in the professional level so it is not an easy task,” said Muhd Abdul Qawiy Wafiyuddin, adding that he is ready to show his strength.
The Brunei contingent also includes PUBG Mobile athletes Muhd Safwan Hakimi bin Abdullah Husaini, Mohd Hadif Fadhli bin Haji Sufari, Mohd Danish Haqeeme Hizami bin Muhaimin and Mohd Danial Hadhrami Safiuddin bin Muhaimin. – Adib Noor
