After a hectic first day of the World DotA Championships, eight teams have finally emerged from the group stages and will now proceed to the playoffs for tomorrow - only two non-Chinese teams remain.
Day 1 opened with NaVi facing off against iG.Z on the main stage in a match which would arguably decide which team topped their group. Zhou and co easily outpushed their opponents on the back of a strong dual core of Broodmother and Lycanthrope which saw the Ukrainians on a one loss deficit after a confident 30 minutes into the game.
However, the highlight of Group A came from the main stage match between Trust and NaVi. A 50 minute thriller culminating in numerous base rush attempts and a Divine Rapier on XBOCT's Spectre witnessed both teams maneurvering around the map hoping for the other to slip. The last few teamfights which went in NaVi's way almost certainly sealed their fate in the playoffs as they now finish second behind Chinese team iG.Z.
1. 
iG.Z
2. 
NaVi
3. 
MitH.Trust
4. AOL
Group B was a straightforward affair as the matches went smoothly in favor of frontrunner DK. The team seemed all too eager to dominate their opponents in their main stage match against Nirvana.cn. Despite a strong performance by both teams, DK prevailed as they came out on top in a couple of crucial teamfights which resulted in complete wipes with minimal casualties.
As expected, defending champions Nirvana.cn were later able to dominate over the other two teams in their group - GK-led TyLoo and replacement team iDeal.Gigabyte. Even as the Thai team took surprising risks in their matches against Nirvana.cn and DK - prominently running a Meepo against the latter - the Chinese were indestructible and all hopes for an Asian presence in the playoffs now rested on compatriots Trust (who were ousted by Navi) and Malaysia's Orange in Group D.
1. DK
2. Nirvana.cn
3. TyLoo
4. iDeal.Gigabyte
Fans from both the Chinese and international community were looking to see if Europe/America's all star team had the tournament in their bag. Arguably the easiest group to top out of the four, EG looked set to proceed on. The match which was broadcasted on the main stage pit EG against PanDa, two teams who were looking well with their hopes of qualifying for tomorrow's playoffs.
Despite getting an early lead with Misery's Nightstalker, an interesting dual core combination of Chaos Knight and Nerubian Weaver pulled the advantage back in PanDa's court as the game progressed. EG's hopes of topping the group slowly slipped out of their reach. The Chinese team played calmly, rightfully retreating when sensing a disadvantage and forcing blind errors from the EG side during a couple of teamfights.
After their bitter loss, EG now had to win over Tongfu, and as one of the last matches to close Day 1, their win guaranteeed their place in tomorrow's playoffs and a third was not played.
1. PanDa
2. 
EG
3. TongFu
4. MT
Touted by fans as this tournament's Group of Death, all four teams seemingly had equal shots at making the playoffs and it all boiled down to which team performed better on the day of competition. As the first few matches went, iG.Y drew first blood taking down LGD and were now ever so close to making the playoffs. Malaysian fans everywhere were now looking to Orange to step up their game in what could be deemed as a 'do or die' situation for Mushi and co.
As one of the last matches played, Orange vs LGD got as tense as it could get as the former tried to cash in on their early advantage against a defensive LGD who were counting on ZSMJ's Syllabear to turn the game around. Despite many key swaps on Syllabear, Orange were seemingly never able to take him out from the fight before he dealt obscene amounts of damage. After one poorly fought teamfight which led to a wipe, a Syllabear-led push easily took down two straight barracks and Orange were forced to call 'GG' in what was indeed a 'good game'.
1. iG.Y
2. WE
3. LGD
4. 
Orange
Tomorrow:
As we look to Day 2 of the World DotA Championships, the matchup between Europe's top contender NaVi and Chinese powerhouse DK will certainly be the highlight of tomorrow's competition. NaVi's amazing comeback in their game against Trust proved, if not their ability to turn games around, that at least they have worked incredibly hard to stay in the tournament and certainly deserve to win this more than ever. 
