Hello, everyone! My name is Anthony Liuzzo (better known as Glum in the VGC community), I’m one of the World Cup managers from last year for Team France, and today I’m going to talk about the rough journey that led me to top cut the World Championships, starting all the way from Day 1.
I started VGC tournaments in 2017 at local events. In 2019, after a messed-up 2018 season, I managed to qualify. After that, I took a hiatus until the 2023 London Open. During this time, it was revealed that the World Championships would be held in Yokohama. Determined to participate, I committed myself to the endeavor. After a half-tone season, I successfully secured my qualification. Allow me to share the journey from my preparation leading up to the final outcome!
Table of Contents
Teambuilding process
At the beginning of the summer, I was really not confident in my capabilities to achieve anything in Japan. I went from a solid start of the season to an absolute nightmare to rack up the last points to qualify. To sum up, I was really not considering myself worthy of the event, so I decided that I had to put myself through a hyperbolic time-chamber kind of training, so I played a lot of games, mainly ladder games because I usually try to avoid this exercise.
And after 3 weeks or so, I finally felt that I had improved, the problem now was to find a good team. I had one idea in mind at that moment : “I want to play a hyper offensive team with Flutter Mane and Tornadus”.
Starting from that point me and my friends Adam Cherfaoui (Shao) and Nicolas Legoux (NewShiny) started to scratch to find something that could buff the tailwind core.
That was the final team of my friends, but I didn’t really liked Iron Bundle in the format so I decided to keep trying to find something that would suit me better.
After some ladder testing I eventually determined the optimal third slot for my team: Single Strike Style Urshifu. The underlying strategy was straightforward: I aimed to eliminate threats after weakening them with chip damage from Dazzling Gleam, leveraging Urshifu’s remarkable offensive capabilities combined with Unseen Fist. The Dark-type Urshifu proved more dependable in practice, especially due to the prevalence of Water-Tera Type slots and the challenge posed by Amoonguss, which either countered Rapid Strike Style Ushifu, or forced them to hold the Safety Goggles.
After that I wasted a fair amount of time giving Gastrodon a chance to shine because in theory it was “good” against Iron Hands, Dondozo, Heatran and Rapid Strike Style Urshifu, but in practice nothing good came from it, so I decided to move on. I saw Eric Rios‘s team and Farigiraf caught my attention, so I tried it.
I liked the team but I knew something was still off… unfortunately I couldn’t find what by myself.
Two weeks remained before the tournament and I was more confident that I had been in June, but still nowhere I wanted to be, so I decided to ask one of my homies, Florian Henry (Shiyo), for some help (it was way more pathetic but let’s embellish the situation) and then he gave me the slot I was lacking.
Heatran was a big tilt in my head, specifically Florian’s set: max Speed, max Special Attack, Fairy Tera Type, simple task: in addition to Urshifu, it cleans the target that survives from the two main Pokémon (mainly opposing Flutter Manes and many more under Sunny Day).
After some practice with the team, I suggested him to switch Rillaboom for Ursaluna, but with a very specific Speed stat to fix some matchups and adding an additional sweep mode to the team.
We were all settled. The team was locked and it felt like it was built for me (first time in 6 years) and I was impatient to compete in Japan!
The Team
Get the team’s paste here!
Flutter Mane @ Choice Specs
Ability: Protosynthesis
Level: 50
Tera Type: Fairy
EVs: 116 HP / 76 Def / 164 SpA / 4 SpD / 148 Spe
Modest Nature
– Moonblast
– Shadow Ball
– Dazzling Gleam
– Psyshock
The superstar of the 2023 season, and the main damage dealer of the team. Nothing really fancy about the set: Fairy Tera Type in combination of Protosynthesis boost and Choice Specs dealt INSANE damage.
I tried to make it faster at the beginning, but the more I was practicing the more I saw Speed-boosting Booster Energy Flutter Mane, so I assumed that a more offensive and bulky set would give me the upper hand in most mirror situations.
252 Atk Sword of Ruin Chien-Pao Ice Spinner vs. 116 HP / 76 Def Flutter Mane: 121-144 (83.4 – 99.3%) — guaranteed 2HKO
252+ Atk Choice Band Dragonite Aerial Ace vs. 116 HP / 76 Def Flutter Mane: 123-145 (84.8 – 100%) — 6.3% chance to OHKO
252+ Atk Mystic Water Tera-Water Urshifu-Rapid Strike Surging Strikes (3 hits) vs. 116 HP / 76 Def Flutter Mane in Sun on a critical hit: 120-144 (82.7 – 99.3%) — guaranteed 2HKO
Heatran @ Life Orb
Ability: Flash Fire
Level: 50
Tera Type: Fairy
EVs: 4 HP / 252 SpA / 252 Spe
Modest Nature
– Heat Wave
– Flash Cannon
– Earth Power
– Protect
The glue that fixed a lot of match-ups. Heatran’s typing combined with Fairy Tera Type is amazing, it automatically fixed my Chi-Yu matchup and it help deal with Urshifu in some situations.
Heat Wave under Sun with the Life Orb boost deals ridiculous damage, and most of all Flash Cannon under Tailwind secured me a lot of Flutter Mane KOs in the late game. Earth Power benefits us in the mirror, since the opponent is virtually forced to Terastallize Heatran into Grass or Fairy (betting on being the fastest Heatran with our invest).
252+ SpA Life Orb Heatran Flash Cannon vs. 116 HP / 4 SpD Flutter Mane: 151-182 (104.1 – 125.5%) — guaranteed OHKO
Urshifu @ Focus Sash
Ability: Unseen Fist
Level: 50
Tera Type: Dark
EVs: 4 HP / 252 Atk / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
– Wicked Blow
– Close Combat
– Sucker Punch
– Detect
My second favorite Pokémon from the tournament. Almost always brought as the 4th slot in games, it finishes the job of the previous attacker like no one else and really simplifies any game state due to his absurd ability to hit through Protect.
Adamant Nature is preferred since I run Focus Sash and I have quite a few speed control solutions; we really wanted to maximize damage, and it also was often in 1v1 end-game situations which gave an Adamant Nature even more credit. I wanted to maximize damage so Dark Tera Type was obvious, and it comes up for some calcs with Farigiraf’s Helping Hand.
252+ Atk Urshifu-Single Strike Wicked Blow vs. 116 HP / 76 Def Flutter Mane on a critical hit: 150-177 (103.4 – 122%) — guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Tera-Dark Urshifu-Single Strike Helping Hand Wicked Blow vs. 236 HP / 156+ Def Amoonguss on a critical hit: 210-248 (95.8 – 113.2%) — 75% chance to OHKO
Tornadus @ Mental Herb
Ability: Prankster
Level: 50
Shiny: Yes
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 252 HP / 156 Def / 4 SpA / 92 SpD / 4 Spe
Bold Nature
– Bleakwind Storm
– Sunny Day
– Tailwind
– Protect
The main character of the event and my strongest soldier during the run.
Tornadus does simple things: it uses Tailwind, mitigates damage from Rapid Strike Style Urshifu and Rain teams, boosts the damage of my Heatran and Flutter Mane, and has a nice coverage move to not be useless when it’s done supporting. Ghost Tera Type and Mental Herb are once again here to ease my mind, as if I really want to click on a support move, no matter the disruption, I will be able to do so thanks to that combination.
252 Atk Mystic Water Tera-Water Urshifu-Rapid Strike Surging Strikes (3 hits) vs. 252 HP / 156+ Def Tornadus on a critical hit: 156-186 (83.8 – 100%) — approx. 6.3% chance to OHKO
252+ Atk Choice Band Sword of Ruin Tera-Normal Dragonite Extreme Speed vs. 252 HP / 156+ Def Tornadus: 153-180 (82.2 – 96.7%) — guaranteed 2HKO
Farigiraf @ Safety Goggles
Ability: Armor Tail
Level: 50
Shiny: Yes
Tera Type: Fairy
EVs: 164 HP / 164 Def / 180 SpD
Bold Nature
– Imprison
– Dazzling Gleam
– Trick Room
– Helping Hand
The second support of the team, its purpose was to annoy priority users like PaoNite (Chien-Pao + Dragonite), imprisoning hard Trick Room teams, and against heavy Tailwind I could just go for Trick Room myself. Helping Hand was really nice in some setups where it messes with damage calcs.
The Fairy Tera Type was useful because of Single Strike Style Urshifu and Chien-Pao being quite common in the metagame.
116+ SpA Choice Specs Tera-Fairy Flutter Mane Moonblast vs. 164 HP / 180 SpD Farigiraf: 178-210 (82.4 – 97.2%) — guaranteed 2HKO
Ursaluna @ Flame Orb
Ability: Guts
Level: 50
Shiny: Yes
Tera Type: Ghost
EVs: 92 HP / 140 Atk / 164 Def / 4 SpD / 108 Spe
Impish Nature
– Facade
– Earthquake
– Swords Dance
– Protect
The alternative path. I did not pick it very often, but it did what I asked it when needed.
I used that Speed to outspeed Chi-Yu under Tailwind, and to outspeed most of those Pokémon with a 50 base Speed (such as Kingambit or Iron Hands), so I could go for a Tailwind lead and then on the last turn I could set up Trick Room, for example. It was a deciding factor against Iron Hands too during the run, making room for outplay and cleaning after they wasted the Tera Type on Flutter Mane.
We decided to run a really bulky set because we wanted to be able to land a hit no matter the board state turn one (after burn damages) and Swords Dance was more than enough to compensate.
140+ Atk Ursaluna Earthquake vs. 252 HP / 0 Def Chi-Yu: 164-194 (101.2 – 119.7%) — guaranteed OHKO
252+ Atk Urshifu-Single Strike Close Combat vs. 92 HP / 164+ Def Ursaluna: 170-204 (78.3 – 94%) — 6.3% chance to OHKO after burn damage
252+ Atk Sword of Ruin Chien-Pao Icicle Crash vs. 92 HP / 164+ Def Ursaluna: 152-180 (70 – 82.9%) — guaranteed 2HKO after burn damage
How to use the team
To summarize, in most situations, if you can’t spot any trouble leading Flutter Mane + Tornadus with Heatran and Urshifu in the back, do so. You can also lead with Flutter Mane + Farigiraf and with Ursaluna in the back; Heatran + Tornadus… it really should come from the preview, so good luck figuring it out!
Tournament run
Day 1
Click on the tabs to see some notes about my matches!
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R1 | WW |  Rikuto Takemoto (スカーレット) |  |  |
I didn’t remember much of the game since I was really tired. It was a good game but I had too much damage for him to go through so I ended up winning the round with the classic game plan.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R2 | WW |  Riley Factura (Riley) |  | |
In Round 2 I had to face one of the players that I was looking up to back in 2017 when I started. I won the first game using the plan established in practice by not clicking Tailwind turn one but rather boosting my Flutter Mane’s damage with Sunny Day, in order to have two boosted Dazzling Gleams instead of one. In game 2, Riley adapted to this, but the result was the same and a critical hit from me locked a well-engaged game for me.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R3 | W?W | Yuma Suzuki (NEO) |    | |
In Round 3 I faced Yuma, 2022 Worlds semifinalist in the Senior division. He led with Roaring Moon, but since I led with Flutter Mane + Tornadus he was “forced” to Terastallize in turn 1. Heatran and Urshifu in the back finished the job.
I don’t remember if I lost a game this round but I know that I won 2 games using the same path and adapting the turn 1.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R4 | WLL | Luka Trejgut (£) |  | |
Probably my favorite set of Day 1, Luka was playing on a really high level, but I managed to win the first game using my usual plan: putting pressure with Flutter Mane + Tornadus. He then adapted really well for the second set by using his Fire-Tera Type Rillaboom. In the third game, I tried to mix up the turn 1 move. The game was really close and could have gone both ways but I was afraid of missing a Heat Wave, so I went for Flash Cannon, missing what would have been a KO, and Luka sealed the bag.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R5 | WLL |  Luca Ceribelli (Yume) |  | |
I didn’t have a great time during this round. The match-up was pretty tricky so I just tried my usual lead to gather information and adapt for the next games. I ended up winning game 1 with a big amount of critical hits from my Urshifu (not from Wicked Blow), a total steal. At the end of the game, before the second one started, Luca called a judge to tell that my Tornadus wasn’t in the right form in the teamlist. I ended up having just a warning since the call was a bit late for a game loss. I know it is a competition and the mistake was mine, but I was really upset, and for the rest of the match I wasn’t in the game, ended up losing game 3 on a 100% win position that I couldn’t see because of my childish attitude. I was really frustrated because he played really well and I would have liked to play the game on normal circumstances, but mental strength is a part of the game and I lost in this round.
Luca, if you read this report, I would like to apologize for denying you a handshake at the end of the round. It’s a competition and you did something that was in your right.
After this round I mentally resetted quite easily thanks to my friends Shao and Nicolas, and I was not stressed at all about myself being one game away from being eliminated, I just wanted to face another good player.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R6 | WW |  Peng Chongjun (伊藤峻峻) | | |
Another really good player, a Regional champion, and the first player to bring the famous Rinya Sun team from last season to success. Unfortunately for Chongjun, the match-up was heavily in my favor and I ended up winning easily. His Gholdengo getting KO’d by Fairy-Tera Type Flutter Mane with just two Dazzling Gleams under the Sun was quite surprising, but that meant that he had no good switches into it.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R7 | WW |  Ezequiel Cordero (ZekromZeke) |  | |
The win and in.
I tried to not think of it as a decisive game but more like a ladder game I wanted to win. The game was really close beside the score. Game 1 was a win thanks to a 50/50 situation I won (the fact that Rillaboom didn’t have a Fire Tera Type helped my Flutter Mane). In the second game, Ezequiel managed to put himself in a good spot, but he was relying on Landorus’s Rock Slides hitting both targets and picking up a KO, and it missed my Flutter Mane, so I instantly won the game and fell in tears.
I did it! After a rough path and a lot of bad luck during the past season, I finally managed to reach Day 2 of the World Championships. I was over the moon at this moment, but little did I knew at this moment that I would do even better the next day.
Day 2 Swiss rounds
Click on the tabs to see some notes about my matches!
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R1 | LWL | Aaron Brok (Aaron) | | |
In game 1 I led with Farigiraf + Ursaluna into Chien-Pao + Iron Hands, but Farifarig was knocked out by a double focus. It was over from there. His Chien-Pao and Urshifu cleaned the game since I didn’t have any speed control. I won game 2 by leading Flutter Mane + Tornadus and chipping the lead Chien-Pao + Iron Hands, to finish it off with Urshifu and Heatran in the back. I used the same lead in game 3, but he adapted with Amoonguss + Iron Hands, and I lost the mind game, losing to Fake Out + Spore.
I was still confident but not satisfied with my set. Aaron played well and took risks when I was just accepting my fate. To sum up, I was playing too conservatively which isn’t my style at all, so I decided to go all out for the next rounds!
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R2 | WW |  Kurt Wonka (Lyon) |    | |
My friends and I played screens a lot during Regulation Set C, and I grew quite the hate against Volcarona, so I was kind of aware of what this team does.
I won the first game by keeping the speed control in my favor and letting Urshifu take care of Volcarona. In game 2 I tried a different approach that almost cost me the game since he sacrificed both Grimmsnarl and Landorus to take out my Urshifu, but from that position I just spammed Bleakwind Storm (ended up having 2 speed drops on Volcarona) and won the game.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R3 | WW | Yusuke Tsuganezawa (えぱ) |     | |
I was pretty confident with the match-up, having Sunny Day on Tornadus made easier the game. I won both games by bringing Tornadus + Flutter Mane and Ursaluna in the back, because thanks to Tailwind and Sunny Day the only damaging option left was the Palafin, but with the bulk on my Ursaluna and the Sun it was not even a 3-hit KO.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R4 | WW | Justin Burns (Justin) | | |
A very good American player, but I had a really good match-up thanks to Heatran under Sun and the pressure of Imprison in Farigiraf. I won both games thanks to the damage edge being in my favor.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R5 | WLW | Nick Navarre (Nails) |   | |
Another very good American player, I was spoiled and very happy about it. From game 1 I quickly realized the key of the match-up would be not making him able to do everything with Baxcalibur and Klefki, so I had to force a Terastallization to let Heatran and Urshifu clean the path with Sun-boosted Heat Waves. Game 2 was really close, but I think he clutched it thanks to a read on a passive play from me. In game 3, I put myself in the winning position sooner. A critical hit on Stomping Tantrum killing my Flutter Mane gave me chills, but it was not important since the damage was already dealt and I was on the winning spot from there.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R6 | LL | Emilio Forbes (Emily) |  |  |
I don’t know where to start. He is probably the best player I have ever faced in my life, he folded me. Brambleghast was horrible against my composition, but I still had some hope because of Urshifu. Little did I know that it got 2-hit-KO’d by Ghost-Tera Type Brambleghast. Even being extremely lucky in game 1 didn’t help me win since almost all of my damaging moves were useless against Brambleghast, who kept putting holes in my team.
I really thought he was going to win the whole tournament, but I needed to focus on the prize on the line. At this moment I forgot that I was just one game away from top cutting the most important event of the season, I just wanted to face good opponents over and over.
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| R7 | WLW |  Alister Sandover (スカーレット) |  |  |
The worst possible outcome, facing one of my long-time Pokémon friends, the man that picked me in NPA some years ago and with whom I built amazing memories in the game and outside of it. But there is no friend during a competition, so I just zoned in again as if I was playing a high-ladder game.
In game 1, I tried to use my Flutter Mane against Iron Hands in the lead just to chip it to see if my Urshifu theory was correct, and it was because after the damage from Flutter Mane, my Dark-Tera Type Urshifu took care of it and I ended up winning the game from there.
In game 2, I got folded since he played very well with Yawn.
In game 3, I decided to play very aggressively from the lead, and it worked quite well until I realized when I clicked Bleakwind Storm on the Flutter Mane and Dondozo (his last 2 Pokémon) that I would have to win a 50/50 to not lose the game on the spot, since my Tornadus would fall asleep at the end of the turn. In case he set up a Substitute and I hit it with Heatran, then Dondozo targeting Heatran would mean I’d lose on the spot. I hit the Bleakwind Storm and got a speed drop, which basically turned the tables; he now was in the losing position, since he couldn’t win with my Heatran around. I targeted the Flutter Mane, which got KO’d. My Tornadus took its guaranteed sleep turn. Dondozo took a lot of recoil damage from using Wave Crash on my Heatran, making it faint from another use of the move or a Bleakwind Storm… but my Tornadus really wanted to show off, and it woke up and connected the move allowing me to accomplish my goal, top cutting the World Championships.
I jumped on the French crew, who were watching the game from behind (which almost got me another warning). It was amazing, everyone was so happy and hyped about the run. I will cherish this moment forever, it happened at the best possible moment and in Japan, where it all started.
Top Cut
| Round | Result | Opponent | Opponent’s team | List |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Top 26 | LL | Federico Camporesi (FedeCampo) | |  |
Federico is a good player, a lot of my friends faced him this season and I was the last to not have faced him yet.
The matchup was not good, but it was alright. In game 1 I think I put myself in a decent position early, but I critted his Ursaluna and realized I would get folded by the free switch of Urshifu since in the process I sacrificed Flutter Mane. In game 2 I tried to defeat Cresselia during turn 1 without wasting the Terastallization, pressing Sunny Day, and I barely missed the KO with my Flutter Mane, and now my plan to avoid getting crept by Lunar Dance was over. I ended up losing some turns later to Iron Hands, who survived a Fairy Tera Type-boosted Dazzling Gleam from Farigiraf despite being at very low health. After the match, I read his report and I saw it was heavily invested in Special Deffense, and I had 0 chances to KO it; information that maybe could have helped me.
Congrats to him on the run! He is such a good player!
Conclusion
And this is how I became the second French player in the Masters division ever to cut the World Championships.
For the first time going to an event, I didn’t think about what placement I wanted to achieve. I didn’t have a goal, I just went to the event thinking “I want to play better than everyone in the venue”. That was far from being the case, but it was mentally really better than being obsessed with the placement as I used to be.
I want to take some time to specifically thank some people now because without them I simply couldn’t have played the event: Sailordut, XVR_18, Aurélien Le Fur (MarioReL), Franck Bourachon (Opalko). Thank you guys for gathering the last Pokémon I needed to play in the event. Obviously thanks to my Team PE, my family and my girlfriend who support me every tournament; to Florian Henry (Shiyo), my practice partner for the event, who found the missing piece for me and who also did extremely well. And thanks to the local Yu-Gi-Oh! community (Ultra Jeux) from Paris, who always cheer for me even though they don’t know the game.
Final shoutouts goes to Adam Cherfaoui, the one who always supports me and pushes me to try harder, he really is my little sunshine in the game and he will show you next year that he is HIM.
Thanks for your time, and have fun with the team!
