The 10th iteration of the “The International” will return to the European zone in Bucharest, Romania after a span of 11 years with Germany being the last venue to ever have hosted an International in 2011. Known as the “TI”, the latter had been an annual event until it was called off in 2020 amid the ongoing Coronavirus Pandemic which forced every Esports initiative to transition to an online format.
We are roughly 12 hours away from the Group Stage of the Ti10 to commence with Dota2 having revealed the Groups earlier today on their blog website. The list of Eighteen teams have been divided into two groups, A and B, as each of them would battle out in a round-robin format. The top four teams from each group will be placed into the winner-bracket of the main event while the teams ending up in the 5th-8th position would enter the lower bracket of the same. The bottom-placed team would ultimately leave the contention.
Here are the two groups determined by Valve:
| Group A |
| Alliance |
| Evil Geniuses |
| Invictus Gaming |
| OG |
| T1 |
| Team Aster |
| Team Undying |
| Thunder Predator |
| Virtus.pro |
| Group B |
| beastcoast |
| Elephant |
| Fnatic |
| PSG.LSD |
| Quincy Crew |
| SG Esports |
| Team Secret |
| Team Spirit |
| Vici Gaming |
Defending Champions OG will face off Alliance in their opener, this time with two new members Syed Sumail “SumaiL” Hassan and Martin “Saksa” Sazdov after Jesse “JerAx” Vainikka and Anatham “ana” Pham hung up there with the former shortly after winning Ti9 while the ana in June 2021. OG have been seeded in Group A along with their counterparts EG provided the fact that there has been some history between them both and would indeed be a fun match to spectate as SumaiL takes over his former teammates.
The opening matchups have been determined by the game developers and are as follows. As per the round-robin format, every team of either group would play more than 1 game on the same day.
Group A match-ups
October 7, 12:30 PM IST
- EG Vs Team Aster
- Invictus Gaming Vs T1
- Virtus.pro Vs Team Undying
- OG Vs Alliance
Group B match-ups
October 7, 14:30 PM IST
- Team Secret Vs Team Spirit
- PSG.LGD Vs Quincy Crew
- Elephant vs beastoast
- VG Vs Fnatic
Group A Round 2
- Invictus Gaming Vs Team Undying
- OG Vs TNC Predator
- Virtus.pro Vs Alliance
- EG Vs T1
Group B Round 2
- PSG.LGD Vs Team Spirit
- Elephant Vs Team Fnatic
- VG Vs SG Esports4. Team Secret Vs beastcoast
Group A Round 3
- EG Vs Invictus Gaming
- Virtus.pro Vs OG
- Team Aster Vs Team Undying
- Alliance Vs TNC Predator
Earlier this week Valve issued a refund against the ticket sales citing a recent spike of COVID-19 cases in Bucharest, Romania as they were forced to move ahead with a crowd-less tournament and decided to accommodate just the players, talent, and either staff members.
The Group stage will run from October 7-10 followed by the main event, scheduled to be played from the dates 12-17.
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