Blacklist International is now assured of a podium finish after taking down home bet RRQ Hoshi, 3-2, to advance to the upper bracket finals of the M4 World Championship, Wednesday night at the Tennis Indoor Stadium Senayan in Jakarta, Indonesia.
RRQ Hoshi weathered Blacklist International’s Game One storm and escaped with a tight 18-19 win in 20 minutes to open up the action-packed series between two of the best ML:BB squads in the world.
The Tier One-backed squad was already poised to take the decider after establishing a great position inside the Lord pit entering the 20th minute. However, VYN (Hilda) broke Blacklist International’s formation which allowed Schevenko “Skylar” Tendean (Claude) to peel the Filipino squad’s backline.
RRQ Hoshi’s assassins quickly jumped into action and scored crucial kills on Kiel “OHEB” Soriano (Brody), Salic “Hadji” Imam (Pharsa), and Johnmar “OhMyV33NUS” Villaluna (Estes).
Danerie “Wise” Del Rosario (Fredrinn) and Edward “Edward” Dapadap (Gloo) tried to defend their base but a five-man RRQ Hoshi contingent proved to be too much for them to handle.
Blacklist International, though, quickly licked its wounds and bagged a quick 19-5 Game Two win in less than 13 minutes to equalize the series.
Edward (Gloo) and OHEB (Brody) played big roles in the lopsided victory, taking three kills each inside the first five minutes of the match to help Blacklist International establish an early 4K gold led that went to as high as 12K.
The 18-year-old EXP laner from Bataan once again took the spotlight in Game Three after coming up with a clutch play midway into the 22nd minute that allowed Blacklist International to close out the series and take a 2-1 lead.
Edward caught Deden “Clayyy” Nurhasan’s Yve napping down the bottom lane as Hadji (Valentina) went on to secure the kill. The rest of Blacklist International focused on the Lord but Rivaldi “R7” Fatah (Grock) managed to steal the major objective.
Blacklist International went on a four-to-nothing exchange before eventually sealing the game despite the Lord siding with RRQ Hoshi, 23-10, in almost 23 minutes of play.
With their backs against the wall, the Kings of Kings recovered late in the endgame to turn back Blacklist International, 15-10, and send the series to a rubber match.
The defending MPL PH champion, led by Danerie “Wise” Del Rosario’s signature Aldous, hit their late-game timer and even led at the latter of the game but a crucial Divine Judgement by VYN (Kaja) on OHEB (Harith) proved to be the decider as RRQ secured a four-man wipe en route to the victory.
Blacklist International then bagged Game Five to complete the win.
Blacklist International will face the winner of the ECHO-ONIC Esports match in the upper bracket finale on January 13, Friday.
