MANILA - With their Valorant Champions Tour playoff campaign dictated by a map, Team Secret held a 11-7 lead against Korean squad Gen.G in Split.

In round 19 of last Sunday’s match, Team Secret let out three ultimates: Jessie “Jessievash” Cuyco with the Seekers (Skye); Jeremy “Jremy” Cabrera with the Showstopper (Raze) and Adrian “Invy” Reyes (Viper) with the Viper’s Pit, in a desperate attempt to get to match point – only to fall into failure.

Barely able to get kills and orbs across the board, Team Secret hardly recovered and Gen.G managed to get to match point first, before Jayvee “Dubstep” Paguirigan won a crucial 1v1 that would force the squad into overtime.

“I think the big thing is communication. That was the key issue today, we just weren't on the same page. We were just all over the place. We weren't playing as one unit. That was the reason why we lost today and that's the reason why we had issues in the past,” head coach Evan “Warbirds” Olzem said following the elimination.

Rookie Invy also agreed, noting that the pressure put them out of order in the later stages of the match.

“Magulo [yung comms]. Daming nangyari eh, di ko na rin alam eh. Siguro bawat round, nape-pressure siguro. Daming gustong gawin tapos yung nagkakagulo na. Di na kami nagtutugma. Pero ayun good game pa rin,” he said.

Ahead of Team Secret’s match against Gen.G, Team Secret absorbed a 1-2 loss against top-seeded DRX.

Warbirds earlier lamented that overthinking and the lack of communication were among things the team needed to work on ahead of the playoffs, which, he said, was evident when they were eliminated.

-- Among other things --

Aside from this, Jremy pointed out that they barely practiced some maps, such as Bind and Split, both used in their losses against Gen.G, and DRX in the playoffs, respectively.

“So dapat yun yung Split hindi kami [masyadong] nag[practice] sa Split and sa DRX, yung veto namin mali kaya kaunti lang practice namin sa last map so medyo may underperformance talaga,” he told ABS-CBN News.

Invy pointed out that time in Korea, where they lived and trained since early this year, also took a toll on them.

“Since nasa Korea hindi namin alam kung ano gawin... Wala kaming, hindi ko alam kung saan pupunta pag destress o makipag-usap kasi usually hindi sila nage-English so hindi kami lumalabas siyempre LAN even. Tapos may pressure pag ano nakikita ang kalaban o ano, [pero] para sakin mass confident ako pag LAN kas mapapakita ko sarili ko sa pressure na ‘yon,” Invy said.

Warbirds said the team will regroup after a couple of weeks to train for the Last Chance Qualifiers for the world championships in Los Angeles, California.