However the ESWC Masters and Blizzard Worldwide Invitational 2008 double champion, who received an auto berth for the regular season as one of the top seeds, will avoid the two mentioned major group contenders and take on Sung Yeon 'Myth' Kim of Beijing E-sports Team as the group stages will follow best of one double elimination format.

The Korean Human veteran made his first public appearance in the qualifier since his team had a shake-up three months ago and he qualified with a neat 2-0 win against Kim 'SaSe' Hammar of Team Alternate.

Two times WCG champion Xiaofeng 'Sky' Li, who yesterday ended his winning drought with the title of Dream Cup Season III finals and received a prize cheque for $200, saw his World Elite team-mate Kejing 'Like' Li join him in the same group along with Korea duo Jin Wook 'Rohjinwook' Roh of All For One and Dong Hwan 'viOlet' Kim from clan WeRRa.

Like has had a great run in the past couple of weeks. Though the China top-flight Orc player had to wait another year for ESWC Grand Final after finishing third in ESWC2008 China, he later made a major breakthrough in his gaming career as he clinched berth for the WCG2008 Global Final after getting first place at WCG2008 China.

He also qualified from one of the toughest groups in the NWL qualifier beating mTw pair Dae Hui 'FoV' Cho and Jin Woo 'Resolver' Lee one after the other. The 20-year-old is all set for his first individual major title.

The regular season will kick off 12:00 CET on Monday, August 11 with Group 1. Weiliang 'Fly100%' Lu of Mousesports will play against Phillip 'Filthy' Edwards of Australian United on Snow Drop while Liwei 'xiaOt' Sun of wNv Teamwork will play against Hyeong Ju 'Check' Lee of mTw on Melting Valley in group semi-finals. Full schedule for Group Stage 1 and more information regarding the league are available in NiceGameTV League Season 1.

Complete group draw

Group 1
Hyeong Ju 'Check' Lee
Phillip 'Filthy' Edwards
Weiliang 'Fly100%' Lu
Liwei 'xiaOt' Sun

Group 2
Yong-Gyun 'Gyunah' Kim
Xuwen 'InFi' Wang
Jong Seok 'ReprisaL' Lee
Du Seop 'WhO' Chang

Group 3
Yong 'Hovermoon' Wang
Jae Wook 'Lucifer' Noh
Jae-Hyuk 'SouthSea' Lee
Sung Hyun 'Space' Park

Group 4
Kejing 'Like' Li
Jin Wook 'Rohjinwook' Roh
Xiaofeng 'Sky' Li
Dong Hwan 'viOlet' Kim

Group 5
Jae Ho 'Moon' Jang
Sung Yeon 'Myth' Kim
Seo Woo 'ReiGn' Kang
Deok Man 'SocceR' Youn

Group 6
Hyo Sub 'FoCuS' Eom
June 'Lyn' Park
Daniel 'LiiLD.C' Claesson
Nikolaus 'SonKiE' Cassidy

Group 7
Jae shin 'EVE' Park
Sung Sik 'ReminD' Kim
Zhuo 'TeD' Zeng
Yoan 'ToD' Merlo

Group 8
Manuel 'GrubbY' Schenkhuizen
Andrew 'mOOn-GLaDe1' Pender
Dae Duck 'Kei' Yoon
Seong Deok 'SoJu' Lee

NiceGameTV