The first set of players opened the offline part of this year's WCS yesterday. VortiX, MMA, Mvp and Bunny played the first group of Europe's round of 16 in ESL TV's Cologne studio, where they competed for two spots in the upcoming League Finals.

Despite the participation of two 2013 season champions - the Korean Terran players MMA and Mvp - the most stellar performance was achieved by VortiX. While his older brother Lucifron retired a few months ago, the Spanish Zerg seems to be at the peak of his career. He not only beat both MMA and Mvp without dropping a single map but also made for some pretty memorable moments with his insane reactions and micro avoiding Mvp's Widow Mines.

The victory over MMA in particular must have been pretty sweet for VortiX as the Korean stopped him just before the finals in the last WCS season. However, the danger of this happening again isn't wholly averted. In the final match of group A, both Koreans met on the field to determine the second spot in the league finals. MMA was the one who secured a spot, although he still felt the need to apologize about it afterwards:

thank you for cheering and sorry again all my fans for my poor performance. next round I will better shape and show you real MMA power!!

— 문성원 ‏(@AcerMMA ) March 25, 2014

WCS continues today with group B, including the first Protoss of the Round of 16: Grubby. The Dutch veteran will meet with Snute, Dayshi and jjakji once more at 18:00 CET. To learn more about the WCS 2014, visit starcraft2.com/wcs.