Who will Verso Time face? Analysis of the 2026 Mid-Season Cup wild card

In just one week, on July 1, the first stage of the global MLBB Mid-Season Cup 2026 tournament kicks off—10 teams, including Verso Time from our EECA region, will compete for the final spot in the group stage. In this article, we’ll take a detailed look at all of the “Monkeys’” wild-card opponents—we’ll profile each team and discuss their chances of advancing to the main stage.

The preliminary stage of the MLBB tournament at the Esports World Cup 2026 will take place from August 1 to 4 in three phases. First, the participants will be divided into two groups of five teams each, where they will play a round-robin best-of-1 format. 

The winners of each group will advance directly to the wild-card playoffs, while the 2nd–4th-place teams will compete in a separate tournament for the remaining two spots in the semifinals. On August 4, three matches will be played—the semifinals and the finals for one playoff slot. The winning team will remain in Paris to prepare for the main stage, which begins on July 22, and is guaranteed $50,000 in prize money. 

Verso Time will begin the tournament in Group B, where it will face the following teams:

To understand the strength of different regions in MLBB, it’s worth first looking at their results in previous similar tournaments.

The wild-card stage was introduced with M5 in December 2023, and EECA has traditionally been among the favorites (largely due to Team Spirit’s results)—but it has only managed to win once.

All Verso Time players had previously competed in the wild-card stage, but none of them had managed to succeed—head coach Vladimir “Ospreay” Gonchar, however, did achieve this with ULFHEDNAR.

Turkish clubs have generally been the most successful at this stage: out of three wild-card appearances, they have advanced to the main stage twice, and only S2G Esports failed at the 2024 Mid-Season Cup, losing all of their matches. Among the other regions represented this time, Mongolia and South America are worth noting, as well as Niightmare from Laos.

Malaysia and China have only secured direct spots in the international tournament this time, while Japan, North America, and the Middle East appear to be underdogs—they have never advanced past the group stage before.

All participants in this stage are league champions from regions where MLBB is just getting started, or finalists from slightly stronger leagues. Additionally, this year MOONTON decided to combine leagues from neighboring countries into additional MCT championships.

As a result, two Mongolian teams and five teams from Japan advanced to the wild-card stage from the East Asia tournament—though they lost the direct slot to the MSC to China’s Guangzhou Gaming, which speaks volumes about the level of play among these teams. Among the champions competing in this tournament are Thailand’s King of Gamers Club, Laos’s Nightmare Esports, and the European roster VSG led by Oleg “Dikson” Pakhomov, whom we know well. 

The runners-up from the top leagues—who have already proven themselves at major tournaments—could prove to be far more dangerous: FUT Esports from Turkey, Team Falcons from the Arab world, Alpha7 North from the U.S., and, of course, Verso Time.

It’s worth noting that only EECA, Turkey, the MENA region, and Thailand held full-fledged regular seasons and playoffs. In other cases, these were not full-fledged leagues, but rather a series of qualifiers.

For example, Japan’s Sunset Ravens won four matches in the national qualifiers but lost both series 0:2 in the final stage of the MCT EA in Shanghai—and The MongolZ crushed SR in two 9-minute games! It’s no surprise that the Japanese team looks like the tournament’s biggest underdog.

Incidentally, of all the participants in the upcoming wild-card tournament, only Verso Time, Niightmare, King of Gamers Club, and VSG comfortably secured their spots in their respective leagues. Falcons and FUT struggled greatly during the regular season and were only able to redeem themselves in the playoffs. The rest also underperformed even within their own region.

At tournaments like this, experience competing on the big stage is crucial—for example, in January, Virtus.pro clearly couldn’t handle the pressure of being the favorite and leading 2–1 in the decisive match for a spot at M7. Verso Time has no shortage of this experience. Although the club is making its debut at MOONTON events, all five players have previously participated in wild-card tournaments, and the head coach knows how to win them—at M6, he did so alongside the Turkish team ULFHEDNAR, defeating Insilio and Yustinian in the final.

However, this time the wild-card bracket features an exceptionally strong lineup: more than 20 players have already competed in the final stages of M-Championships, the Mid-Season Cup, or the MLBB Sea Cup (the predecessor to the MSC). Among the familiar teams, Team Falcons and Niightmare Esports stand out the most. The team from Saudi Arabia finished 9th–11th at M7 in January, but their form dipped by spring and they ended up in second place in the MPL MENA league—though they’ll still be a formidable opponent. The team from Laos, meanwhile, consistently participates in the wild-card stage, but its performance has been getting weaker every year.

The teams from Mongolia are also worth keeping an eye on. After competing at the M7 World Championship, the roster split into two—some players now compete for MongolZ, while others represent Huns Esports. Individually, they were outmatched by China at the MCT EA, but they could still pull off a surprise. There’s also a spot in the wild-card for pro-scene stars—Shayakrit “Framezy” Buangern from King of Gamers Club won the very first MLBB SEA Cup, and Nahanael “Nathzz” Estrolog (Alpha7 North) did the same five years later. Let’s not forget Karl “Carvi” Tinio, who finished fourth at M5 with the current Team Spirit roster. Although, of course, all these players are in a completely different form now.

Almost every team has someone who has already proven themselves at major tournaments. The only exception is the Japanese team Sunset Ravens.

VSG roamer Michael “Boro” Busch recently highlighted his team, Verso Time, and FUT Esports as favorites in the wild-card stage. Teams from Europe and Turkey are indeed performing better than the rest at this stage and are showcasing a high level of play, but they’ll face plenty of worthy opponents.

First and foremost, Team Falcons deserves a mention—they nearly made it to the World Championship playoffs in January. Mongolian teams are capable of pulling off surprises from time to time, Nightmare Esports has a wealth of experience in similar events, and Alpha7 North has assembled a very talented roster—we might simply have forgotten about them due to the suspension of the North American league in 2025.

Of the clear underdogs, only the Sunset Ravens are worth mentioning: the Japanese scene is too weak, and the team qualified for the tournament solely thanks to the MCT format. Otherwise, Verso Time definitely shouldn’t underestimate their opponents—each team will bring a unique set of strategies from their region and a distinct playstyle to Paris, which will be difficult to adapt to in a best-of-1 format and a short tournament overall.