History of Topics 2005

  Cho U has scored his second win in two games in the 30th Meijin title match. At this point, the omens are looking very good for a successful title defence.
  The second game was played at the JAL Resort Seahawk Hotel Fukuoka (the Japanese like long names for their hotels) on 22 and 23 September. Playing white, Cho won by 6.5 points. Unlike the first game, however, in which he led all the way, this actually started out as a good game for the challenger, Kobayashi Satoru 9-dan, especially on the first day, on which he built thickness in typical Kobayashi style. Unfortunately for him, his play became a little erratic and slack on the second day, and he missed his opportunities to wrap up a win. He has less than a week to recover before the third game, which will be played on 28 and 29 September. If he loses this, he will be in real trouble.

  It wasn't to be: the new record for youthfulness in a title winner has been put on hold. The experience of the 26-year-old Kim Shujun 7-dan was too much for the 16-year-old Iyama Yuta 4-dan. In the second game of the best-of-three title match, Kim Shujun scored another win, so he has won his first title on what was his last chance in the King of the New Stars tournament. Iyama still has a chance to set a record in the upcoming Agon Kiriyama Cup final.
  The game was played at the Nihon Ki-in on 23 September. Taking white, Kim won by resignation.

  In the second semifinal of the winners' section of the 44th Judan tournament, Takao Shinji Honinbo (W) defeated O Rissei 9-dan by resignation. He will meet Mimura Tomoyasu 9-dan in the final.
  Players who lose in the winners' section move sideways to the losers' section, so this, of course, lags by a couple of rounds. At this point, Cho U Meijin is in the best position, needing just two more wins to make the play-off to decide the challenger.

  One game was played in the A League of the 30th Kisei tournament on 22 September. Taking black, Mimura Tomoyasu 9-dan defeated Yoda Norimoto Gosei by resignation. Mimura now has a good chance of keeping his place in the league. Yoda still has an outside chance, thanks to his high rank in the league. The final round of the league will be held on 6 October.

  Michael Redmond 9-dan played two games in the Japanese qualifying tournament for the 19th Fujitsu Cup on 19 September. In the first, taking black, he defeated Kim Shujun 7-dan by resignation, but in the second he lost, holding black, to Mimura Tomoyasu 9-dan by 3.5 points.

  In our previous report, we mentioned that the 16-year old Iyama Yuta 4-dan was in the running to set a new record for youngest titleholder in the final of the Agon Kiriyama Cup, scheduled for 8 October. Before that, he also has a chance to set the record for the youngest winner of a junior title, as he has reached the best-of-three play-off for the 30th King of the New Stars title. However, he has made a bad start, losing the first game to the 26-year-old Kim Shujun 7-dan. The game was played at the Kansai Headquarters of the Nihon Ki-in in Osaka on 15 September. Playing black, Kim won by resignation.
  Everyone wants to see Iyama set a record, either in this title or in the upcoming Agon Kiriyama Cup final, but his opponent Kim Shujun is also strongly motivated. He's one year older than Cho U and for a while he was spoken of in the same breath as a promising player, but the latter has pulled way ahead. Kim has played in four New Stars and one NEC New Stars finals and lost all of them. He also lost a play-off to decide the Tengen challenger, so he must be getting quite anxious to pick up his first title.
  As of the 31st term, this title is going to be renamed the King of the New Stars U-25 tournament (which by the sponsor's fiat means '25 and under'), down from the current age limit of 30. The time allowance per player will be shortened from four hours to three.
  The above game was the last to be played in the Nishi-Tenma headquarters of the Nihon Ki-in in Kita Ward in Osaka. The building has deteriorated with age, so the Kansai Ki-in is moving to a new building located in Umeda, which is a transportation hub, in the same ward. It will reopen on the 6th floor of the Hankyu Five Annex Building on 12 October.
  The second game of the title match will be played at the Nihon Ki-in in Tokyo on 23 September. The third game, if needed, is scheduled for 5 October.

  Kono Rin 7-dan will make his first challenge for a big-seven title. The play-off to decide the challenger to Yamashita Keigo for the 31st Tengen title was held at the Kansai Ki-in on 15 September; Kono (W) defeated Imamura Toshiya 9-dan by half a point.
  The 24-year-old Kono has been considered a promising player for several years now, but so far his best performance, in our opinion, has been in an international tournament, the 14th Fujitsu Cup in 2001, in which he reached the quarterfinals; along the way, he beat two of the top four players in the Chinese rating system (his teacher, Kobayashi Koichi, beat the other two). Since then, we've been waiting for Kono to distinguish himself on the local scene; after four years, he's finally made his move. His results this year are an impressive 26 wins to just 7 losses (fourth in the rankings), so he seems to be in excellent form.
  Actually, two years ago Kono lost the Tengen play-off to the current titleholder, Yamashita. He now has a chance to take revenge.

  In a game in the fourth round of the A League in the 30th Kisei tournament, played on 15 September, Yuki Satoshi 9-dan (W) defeated Honda Kunihisa 9-dan, a fellow member of the Kansai Ki-in, by resignation. As the only undefeated and the highest ranked player, Yuki has already won the league regardless of the results in the final round. His opponent there, Kato Atsushi 8-dan, could draw level on 4-1, but the higher-ranked player takes precedence in the case of a tied score.

  The fourth vacant seat in the 61st Honinbo League was claimed by Yamada Kimio 8-dan. In the play-off, held on 12 September, he defeated Kobayashi Satoru 9-dan (B) by 5.5 points. The game was held on a Monday because of Kobayashi's hectic schedule now that he is engaged in the Meijin title match (he had another game on the Thursday; fortunately for him, he won that one, defeating Hikosaka Naoto in the Losers' Section of the Judan tournament).

  In a game played on 15 September, Mimura Tomoyasu 9-dan (B) defeated Yamashita Keigo Tengen by 2.5 points and so reached the final of the Winners' Section of the 44th Judan tournament. His opponent there will be either O Rissei 9-dan or Takao Shinji Honinbo. Mimura would have to win not only that game but also the play-off with the winner of the Losers' Section to make his first big-seven title challenge.

  The form of Cho U Meijin and the challenger Kobayashi Satoru 9-dan going into the 30th Meijin title match was a complete contrast. Kobayashi was enjoying marvellous form and had a winning percentage of 84% (32 wins 6 losses), which is very unusual for a player who mainly plays other top players. Cho U, on the other hand, has been losing a lot of games this year and had recently been stripped of his Honinbo title (his record was 28-17). However, his slump could be blamed in part on his hectic schedule in domestic and international tournaments. Actually, until he lost the Honinbo title he held seven titles, five domestic (Meijin, Honinbo, Oza, NHK, and NEC) and two international (TV Asia and LG), so it's a moot point whether the term 'bad form' is applicable.
  At any rate, a best-of-seven title match, with its two-day games, is, in a sense, cocooned off from the ordinary go scene. It gives a player who is struggling a chance to regain form. That seems to be what happened in the first game, which was held at the Hotel Sunlife Garden in Hiratsuka City on 7 & 8 September. Kobayashi Satoru got off to a slightly inferior start when Cho cleverly sacrificed a potentially heavy group. Thereafter, the pressure was on Kobayashi, but he was unable to catch up. Playing white, Cho secured a resignation after 135 moves.
  The second game is scheduled for 22 & 23 September.

  In the play-off to decide the challenger to Cho U for the 53rd Oza title, held at the Nihon Ki-in on 8 September, Yamashita Keigo 9-dan (B) defeated Nakaonoda Tomomi 9-dan by resignation. This secures Yamashita a return match with Cho; his challenge last year failed by a 1-3 margin.
  The first game will be played on 28 October.

  The 16-year-old Iyama Yuta 4-dan is still hot in the 12th Agon Kiriyama Cup. Earlier he made news when he beat Cho U and O Rissei in the first two rounds of the main tournament. In the semifinal, held on 8 September, his run continued; taking white, he defeated Cho Chikun Judan by resignation, so he has qualified for the final, in which his opponent will be Kobayashi Satoru. The latter secured his place by defeating So Yokoku 7-dan by 2.5 points on 22 August.
  The showdown will take place at the headquarters of the Agon sect of Buddhism in Kyoto on 8 October. If Iyama wins, he will set a new record for the youngest player to win a title. At present, it's held by Cho Chikun, who won the New Stars tournament just after he had turned 17.

(25 August)	In the A League, Yoda Norimoto Gosei (B) defeated Honda Kunihisa 9-dan by 2.5 points. In the B League, all six players had been on 1-1 and they all played a game, so at this point the league was evenly split between players on 2-1 and 1-2. The results: Yamashita Keigo Tengen (W) beat Imamura Toshiya 9-dan by resig.; Komatsu Hideki 9-dan (B) beat O Rissei 9-dan by 3.5 points; and Kobayashi Satoru 9-dan (W) beat O Meien 9-dan by 6.5 points.
(1 September)	In the A League, Kato Atsushi 8-dan (W) beat Cho U Meijin by half a point. In the B League, Yamashita Keigo Tengen (B) beat Kobayashi Satoru by resignation.
(8 September)	In the B League, Komatsu Hideki (W) beat O Meien by resignation.

  As before, Yuki Satoshi retains the sole lead in the A League. In the B League, Komatsu has drawn level with Yamashita, but he needs Yamashita to lose his final game while he wins to win the league. If they finish tied, Yamashita prevails because of his higher rank in the league.

  Mizokami Tomochika 8-dan and Tsuruyama Atsushi 6-dan have qualified for the main tournament of the 10th Samsung Cup. In 2001, the Korean sponsors threw the qualifying tournament held in Seoul, which decides 16 of the 32 places in the main tournament, completely open to all professionals. For the first time, two Japanese won seats. Ten Koreans and four Chinese players also qualified.
  Sixty players from Japan (45 from the Nihon Ki-in and 15 from the Kansai Ki-in) participated in the qualifying tournament, held from 24 to 30 August. For the second year in a row, Ryu Shikun 9-dan lost in the final round. Cho Riyu 7-dan also lost in this round. Actually, the other two players were paired against fellow Japanese representatives, so Japan was guaranteed two places. Mizokami beat Oya Koichi 9-dan and Tsuruyama beat Kim Shujun 7-dan.
  Rui Naiwei 9-dan was among the Korean representatives winning a place.
  The opening rounds of the 10th Cup will be held on 28 and 30 September. Four Japanese players are seeded: Hane Naoki Kisei and Takao Shinji Honinbo (as seeds for Japan), Cho Chikun Judan (as 'Samsung ranking seed', because he has won this tournament), and Yoda Norimoto Gosei ('recommended by the sponsors'). Cho U is unavailable, of course, as the opening rounds clash with the Meijin title match; having lost the title, Yoda is free to play in the Samsung Cup.

  Kobayashi Koichi 9-dan has become the fourth player to reach the mark of 1,200 wins. He did this with a win over Ezura Yuichi 8-dan in the 31st Kisei B Preliminary on 1 September. He is the fourth player to do so, after the late Kato Masao 9-dan, Rin Kaiho, Honorary Tengen, and Cho Chikun Judan. At 52 years 11 months, he did it at the second youngest age, after Cho Chikun.
  At this point, his record was 1,200 wins, 598 losses, and 2 jigo, giving him a winning percentage of 66.7%, the best of the four.

  Hiraoka Satoshi has long been one of the top amateur players in Japan, and in 1994 he won the World Amateur Go Championship. However, he has only just now won the Amateur Honinbo tournament for the first time, though it was the third time he had made the final.
  Seventy-three finalists and seeded players competed in the main round of the 53rd tournament, which was held at the Nihon Ki-in in Tokyo from 26 to 28 August. In the final, Hiraoka (W) defeated Nakazono Seizo, a five-time champion, by half a point.

  After three years with the new komi of 6.5 points, White's winning percentage in professional play has almost caught up with Black's. In the 1,042 games played in the first seven months of this year at the Nihon Ki-in, White won 49.48%, which seems to indicate that the komi reform has achieved its goal.

Promotions
  To 8-dan: So Yokoku (scored 150 wins as a 7-dan)
  To 7-dan: Shimohira Akio (scored 120 wins as a 6-dan)
  To 5-dan: Takemiya Yoko (scored 70 wins as a 4-dan)
  To 2-dan: Ms. Furusho Katsuko (scored 30 wins as a 1-dan)

  Michael Redmond 9-dan (W) defeated Kojima Takaho 9-dan by resignation in Preliminary A of the 32nd Tengen tournament.
  On 5 September, Michael (B) beat Okada Shinichiro 8-dan by resignation in Preliminary B of the Japanese qualifying tournament for the 19th Fujitsu Cup.
  On 8 September, Michael (W) defeated Rin Shien 6-dan by 12.5 points (Preliminary A, 54th Oza tournament).
  Correction: The date for the Yasuda game given in our last report should have been 18 August, not 18 July.