Japanese Title: Mao and Suiren! Super Full-Force Friendship Battle!!
Original Airdate: July 14, 2019
US Airdate: November 16, 2019
We now enter the round of 16, and Mallow is nervous about facing Lana, who she's known for such a long time.
- Always Someone Better: Despite having type advantage and a fully evolved Tsareena on her side, Mallow's lack of battle experience and training comes back to bite her against Lana, whose Primarina easily counters and defeats Tsareena.
- Cheaters Never Prosper: Faba uses his Hypno to try and rig his match with Ash by having him bring Meltan out of his Pokeball. But when the match starts, Meltan eats Hypno's pendulum, leaving it helpless and easily defeated.
- Comically Missing the Point: After Faba shrewdly has Hypno summon Meltan out of its ball, Ash sees its excitement and just assumes it wanted to battle, switching strategies without any suspicion.
- Curb-Stomp Battle:
- Ash vs. Faba, Guzma vs. Ilima and Mallow vs. Lana with the first two of the battles in the former's favor and the third in the latter's favor.
- Determinator: Although she almost forfeits the battle until Lana encourages her to finish it, Mallow doesn't give up on the battle until it was over and was able to perfect her Z-Moves through her best friend's help.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Faba thought he'd have the advantage by using his Hypno to pit himself against Ash's Meltan. Unfortunately, Hypno's pendulum is made of metal...that Meltan quickly eats, leaving Hypno helpless.
- Kick the Dog: Guzma's Scizor beats Ilima's Kangaskhan by deliberately positioning her baby to be between her and it allowing the Scissors Pokémon to beat the Parent Pokémon while she's hesitant to attack.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Faba attempting to rig the match by choosing what he assumed to be Ash's weakest Pokemon, has him getting knocked out easily.
- Olympus Mons: Ash uses Meltan to past the first 1 on 1 round. Amusingly, Faba fixed Meltan to be chosen over Pikachu, assuming Meltan to be Ash's weakest Pokemon.
- Oh, Crap!: Faba and Hypno's response when Meltan eats half of Hypno's pendulum. The stunned Psychic-type is then knocked out via Flash Cannon to the face. Ouch.
- One-Hit KO: Hypno is taken down by one Flash Cannon.
- Scissors Cuts Rock: Type advantage doesn't stop Lana from taking out Mallow's Tsareena.
- Sure, Let's Go with That: After Faba secretly brings out Meltan during the match, Ash just assumes Meltan wanted to battle and goes along with it, with Meltan having no objections.
- Underestimating Badassery: Faba attempts to rig his battle against Ash, assuming Meltan to be his weakest party member. Hypno's pendulum doesn't fare well against the hungry metal-eater however, and one Flash Cannon later, Meltan wins, sending Ash to the quarterfinals and eliminating Faba from the tournament.
- The Worf Effect: Twice;
- Ilima (The same person who managed to take out a hoard of Guzma's grunts in an earlier episode.) lost to their boss despite using a Mega Khangaskhan (Y'know, one of the most busted competitive Pokemon ever.) This is due to Guzma's dirty tricks (see Kick the Dog above)
- Mallow, despite taking out Team Rocket with no problem, earns her first true loss here, as she has never done competitive battles before.
