Just 16 hours after emerging victorious in a five-game thriller to advance to the upper bracket finals, the Tzy brothers brought their A-game and took turns leading AP.Bren as they swept Blacklist International 3-0 to secure the first ticket to the M5 World Championship in the Mobile Legends Bang Bang Professional League (MPL) Philippines Season 12 playoffs at the EVM Convention Center in Quezon City on Friday.
AP.Bren will make their second M-series appearance after going all the way to the title during the M2 World Championship, with former jungler Karl “KarlTzy” Nepomuceno taking the MVP award.
For AP.Bren head coach Francis “Duckey” Glindro, surviving a tight series against RSG Philippines just a day prior helped his team prepare better for their match-up against Blacklist.
“Andami naming realizations after nung match with RSG. There were several factors kaya medyo messy yung first few games namin sa RSG. Right after nung game while we were in transit pauwi ng bootcamp, we talked about changing things out,” explained Duckey.
“Mali yung approach namin sa game. Napasobra yung gigil. This time pinagchill lang namin sila. Dun sa pep talk pa lang inayos na namin. Hindi na namin sila hinype. Dun sa draft, napredict namin. I think overall, they just went faraway.”
FlapTzy (Terizla) spearheaded the Hornets’ opening assault with his initiations and well-timed penalty zone setups, which helped AP.Bren dominate the opener. He achieved an impressive 0-1-9 KDA in AP.Bren’s 14-minute Game 1 victory.
In Game 2, it was Kyle Angelo “KyleTzy” Sayson’s turn to shine with his signature Fanny pick. He made an early impact with a 5-1-2 KDA, contributing to another dominant showing for AP.Bren and putting them at match point.
Game 4 seemed imminent when Kiel “Oheb” Soriano’s (Brody) 12th double kill helped Blacklist gain control in the late game.
However, Marco Stephen “Super Marco” Requitiano (Beatrix) executed a clever segueway play in the 20th minute that confused Blacklist and led to AP.Bren securing a lord objective, which they used to mount a series-clinching base turret siege a minute later.
All is not lost for Blacklist, though, as they have one more chance in the lower bracket finals to secure the last slot for MPL Philippines in the M5 World Championship. They will face the winner of the Echo-RSG Philippines matchup later today.
