Almost two years ago, Bren Esports kick-started the Philippines’ dominance in the Mobile Legends: Bang Bang scene after successfully bagging the country’s first-ever world title in the M2 World Championship.
The team, of course, first conquered the local ML:BB stage by nabbing the MPL Philippines Season Six title and The Nationals ML:BB title before taking over the world tilt.
So, when SIBOL started to gear up for its title defense in the 31st Southeast Asian Games in Vietnam, they made sure to tap the man behind Bren Esports’ unprecedented success.
“For those that don’t know, I was supposed to handle or I was supposed to be the coach for the 2021 SEA Games ML:BB men’s team,” newly-installed SIBOL men’s ML:BB head coach Francis “Duckey” Glindro told Tiebreaker Times.
Indeed, it was a special moment for Glindro, who started his coaching career in Indonesia before heading back to the Philippines to coach Bren Esports.
Unfortunately, things failed to materialize as the 31st Southeast Asian Games, which was supposed to take place in November of 2021, was pushed back to 2022 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
And when SIBOL decided to hit the restart button on the team’s buildup, they decided to take a different route and held a qualifier instead with the winning team earning the right to represent the Philippines in the Games.
Blacklist International won the qualifier while Bren Esports finished outside of the top four. This automatically gave the coaching reins to Kristoffer “Bon Chan” Ricaplaza, who eventually led the Philippines to its second consecutive gold medal in Vietnam.
“Unfortunately, it fell through because of the pandemic and what happened was I think SIBOL decided to… I think it was a new direction that SIBOL wanted to go for,” recalled the MPL PH champion coach.
“What they decided on was to have a qualifying event wherein kung sino yung mananalo, the coach of the winning team will actually coach the national team. Unfortunately, my team didn’t qualify because there were a lot of stronger teams than us back then,” he added.
But as the saying goes, if it’s meant to be, it will be.
As fate would have it, Duckey got another crack at the job and seized it after leading Bren Esports to the top of the 2023 SIBOL National Team qualifiers.
The former world champion coach vowed to do everything that he can to help the national team’s cause and deliver the country’s third consecutive gold medal in the SEA Games.
“I’m just happy that this time around, I get my hands on handling the national team.”
