CHO MAKES IT FOUR MEIJINS IN A ROW
Cho Chikun has won the fifth game of the 24th Meijin final, and with it his fourth consecutive Meijin title. Playing Yoda Norimoto 9-dan in Kofu City on 20 and 21 October 1999, Cho was forced to play an alien style, but showed he was capable of playing any which way.
Yoda once again started eccentrically in the top left corner, and on the now rare 3-3 point at that. He also tried to disorient his opponent by playing in Cho's normal territory-grabbing style. Cho rode the waves and let Yoda take all four corners and switched to an influence-oriented game.
Play was again slow on Day 1 - just 49 moves played. A difficult middle game ensued after a surprisingly early invasion with Black 27, but the focus was not, in this case, on life and death but on the relative merits of the two players' moyos - large but loosely mapped out claims to territory.
A very close endgame resulted, but with both players under time pressure, slight slips by Yoda gave Cho a 1.5 point margin of victory after the 11th hour of play on the second day.
Game 5 in sgf format is available here. To download, right-click and choose "save the link" on your machine.
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Older News From October 15 1999:
CHO CHIKUN POISED TO TAKE FOURTH CONSECUTIVE TITLE
Cho Chikun 9-dan has moved to within one game of four straight Meijin titles by defeating challenger Yoda Norimoto in 195 moves in Game 4 of the 24th Meijin. He now leads 3-1.
After an incredibly slow first day, when just 24 moves were played, Yoda (White) secured sente to play the crosscut of 32 and 34. He wanted thickness to reinforce his sente group and Cho opted for more profit to go with the territory he had made in the top left, but everyone seemed to agree that White had much the better game.
With both players playing to their respective styles, observer Takemiya Masaki 9-dan predicted a drawn-out game. But Black 75 was a skilful erasure of White's moyo and Cho began to close the gap. 91, played when he was already in overtime, was another good move that established his lead. Out of his 8-hour allowance, Cho spent 39 minutes on move 13, 34 on 15 and 53 on 19. Yoda, playing just as slowly, spent 57 minutes on move 10, 49 on 14.
Game 4 in sgf format is available here. To download, right-click and choose to save the link on your machine.
At the civic reception before the game, Yoda said that he knew he was up against an opponent that was maybe too tough for him, but he was determined to win the Meijin at least once in his life.
Cho replied that as he hoped to win the Meijin at least 10 times on the trot to match his record in the Honinbo, he wished Yoda a long life. Game 5 is in the Tokiwa Hotel, Kofu City, Yamanashi Prefecture on 20 October.
The earlier games of the current Meijin final are also available here in
sgf format. To download, right-click on the game number and choose to save the link on your machine.
Game 1
Game 2
Game 3
More details (in Japanese) on: http://www.asahi.com/paper/igo/24ki/991014/index.html
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Older News From October 3 1999:
YODA PULLS BACK TO 2-1 IN MEIJIN WITH NOVEL OPENING
3 October: Challenger Yoda Norimoto 9-dan has kept his hopes alive with a crushing victory in the third game of the best-of-seven Meijin title match. But we have yet to hear how much of his victory was due to the novel first move he played. It certainly seemed to surprise holder Cho Chikun 9-dan.
Normally the first move is played in the top right hand corner of the board. The only common exception is a play at the centre point. But the right-handed Yoda began with the unprecedented and awkward stretch over to the top left.
Because the go board is not actually a square, such a play can create unusual perspectives on familiar positions. It is not against the rules to play this way, but similar solecisms in go and shogi in the past have led to furious behind-the-scenes arguments and the perpetrators have been known to shave their heads in atonement.
We keenly await Yoda's appearance in Game 4, in Urawa City (Saitama Prefecture) on 13 October. Game 3 of the 24th Meijin Final match was played on 29 and 30 September in the spa resort of Atami City, Shizuoka Prefecture. Just 32 moves were played on Day 1. At the end of the second day, both players had only two minutes left of their 8-hour allowances.
More details on www.asahi.com/paper/igo (in Japanese).
24th MEIJIN LEAGUE
The results of the 24th Meijin League were as follows (players initially ranked according to the results of the 23rd League; X denotes relegation).
|
|
O |
K |
Y |
K |
R |
T |
K |
M |
S |
|
4 |
O Rissei 9d |
- |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
5-3 |
| 5 |
Kato Masao 9d |
1 |
- |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
0 |
1 |
1 |
4-4 |
| 1= |
Yoda Norimoto 9d |
1 |
1 |
- |
0 |
1 |
0 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
6-2 |
| 1= |
Kobayashi Koichi 9d |
1 |
1 |
1 |
- |
0 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
0 |
6-2 |
| 3 |
Ryu Shikun 7d |
0 |
1 |
0 |
1 |
- |
1 |
1 |
1 |
1 |
6-2 |
| 6 |
Takemiya Masaki 9d |
0 |
0 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
- |
1 |
0 |
1 |
3-5 |
| X |
Kobayashi Satoru 9d |
0 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
- |
1 |
1 |
3-5 |
| X |
Mimura Tomoyasu 8d |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
0 |
- |
1 |
2-6 |
| X |
Sakai Maki 7d |
0 |
0 |
0 |
1 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
- |
1-7 |
Yoda won the playoff by 0.5 point on 5 August against Kobayashi Koichi.
HOW DOES THE MEIJIN TOURNAMENT WORK?
The Meijin tournament is now sponsored by the newspaper Asahi Shinbun. It was previously sponsored by the Yomiuri Shinbun, but after a dispute with the Nihon Ki-in over funding, the Yomiuri switched to the Kisei tournament and their version of the Meijin, which ran from 1962 to 1975 - when it was the most important tournament - is now referred to as the Old Meijin.
Top prize is 28 million yen.
The title holder is challenged each Autumn by a challenger who is the winner of a nine-man all-play-all league. The bottom three in the league are demoted. Entry to the league is via preliminary tournaments held in three stages. The Third Preliminary comprises three separate knockouts, and the winners of each take one of the vacant league places.
Ties for first place are resolved by a playoff (between the two top ranking players if there are more than two tied). Ties for demotion places are decided according to previous performances in the tournament.
In the final (best-of seven) each player has 8 hours thinking time over two days. Each game of the final is played in a different city. In all other games thinking time is 5 hours each. Komi has always been 5.5 points.
The word Meijin (Mingren in Chinese, Myeongin in Korean) derives from Chinese and denotes a Master of something esoteric, such as medicine. In go it was famously first applied to Honinbo Sansa by the military ruler Oda Nobunaga at the end of the 16th century. Since then it became the lifetime title of the senior player of the age, and was equivalent to 9-dan. The last lifetime Meijin was Honinbo Shusai who died in 1940 after bequeathing his titles to the Nihon Ki-in. The first 9-dan who was not a Meijin emerged in 1949 (Fujisawa Kuranosuke).
Honinbo Shusai is the subject of the novel "Meijin" by Nobel prize winner Kawabata Yasunari (translated by Edward Seidensticker as "The Master of Go"). It is a slightly fictionalised account of Shusai's famous last game against young star Kitani Minoru. It can be seen as an elegiac comment on the passing of the old ways in Japan.
The format of the tournament sponsored by the newspaper Yomiuri Shinbun was similar but the komi was 5 points, White winning jigo (ties). A win by jigo was classed as less than other wins, and this affected the outcome of the first term which was decided by a 13-man league.
To see a list of past Meijin Winners click here.
