The second Masters of 2023 World Tour will be held in the Philippines next weekend. Following the tournament in Utsunomiya, the best 3×3 players will represent their teams and try to win a title in Manila in front of a passionate crowd in the stands. Let’s go through what we will watch.
12 teams will take part in the main draw in Manila Masters as the competition contains four groups of three teams. Pool fixtures will be played on May 20th, while the elimination stage starts on May 21st. Two teams with the highest ranking in each group will proceed to the quarterfinal.
Ub, Utsunomiya, and Manila will compete for two places in top 8 in pool A.
Riga, Dusseldorf, and San Juan will battle for the quarterfinal in group B.
Amsterdam, Futian, and Tsukuba are members of pool C.
Sansar, Beijing, and Al Wakrah will have a contest in group D.
Ub continues impressive form from the last campaign as they emerged victorious in the first Masters in Utsunomiya. On the other hand, Manila’s players are working hard before the tournament hoping they can shock favorites from Serbia. Mac Tallo, their best player, expects strong support from the crowd in their attempt to reach the quarterfinals.
Utsunomiya’s supporters believe that Japanese players could repeat the result from the previous competition and proceed to Top8.
Riga is weakened with the departure of Karlis Lasmanis and Nauris Miezis, but still wants to be competitive on a global stage. However, the Latvian team will have a strong opponent in San Juan who won the Ulaanbaatar Super Quest surprisingly at the beginning of the season. Edgar Krumins and Agnis Cavars, Riga’s players, should also take seriously runner-up from Super Quest in Mongolia – Dusseldorf.
Amsterdam’s squad got new reinforcement as former basketball player Worthy De Jong came to the Dutch team. Chinese team Futian looks to make Amsterdam’s way to the trophy tough with Belgian and Dutch superstars Thibaut Vervoort and Dimeo Van Der Horst, respectively.
Anand Ariunbold, a winner of the 2023 Asian Cup, is playing superbly and wants to help his team Sansar to win the trophy in the Philippines. Beijing, a winner of last week’s Shenzhen Challenger, is standing on its way with the Latvian powerful duo Lasmanis and Miezis.
It wouldn’t be a shock if some “dark horse” claims the trophy in Manila because new high-quality players in “weaker” adapted after a couple of weeks and brought additional value to their performance.
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