Senzaki upsets former Meijin
In the A class, two games were played and we had the first major upset. Senzaki beat Sato Yasumitsu to take a big leap out of the danger zone as both players now have 2-1 scores. It was a good win for Senzaki, who found a nice way to counter Sato's rushed attack in the late middle game. After this, things were still quite complicated, but it was not Senzaki, but the former Meijin who lost after an uncharacteristic endgame mistake.
In the other A class game Moriuchi and Morishita fought another epic battle. In the last three years their A class encounters have taken 253 moves, 163 moves and 139 moves. The game they played this time fit exactly in that pattern as it finished a 1:34 in the morning after a gruelling 171 moves. Morishita seemed to have a very strong attack, but Moriuchi managed to get an entering king that Morishita could have stopped at some point.
Even with the entering king, it was very questionable if Moriuchi would have enough points to get a jishogi. Therefore, he had to attack desperately and usually Morishita is at his best when he is defending, but this time he made a mistake in byoyomi. After this Moriuchi's attack got decisive strength and he won to extend his perfect record to 3-0. Moriuchi has been very close to challenging for the Meijin title in the past couple of years. Will he finally succeed this time?
Miura promotes?
In B1, Nakahara showed that he is still a force to be reckoned with as he beat Fujii in a B1 Junisen game that was delayed because of Fujii's Oza title match game with Habu. Both players really went at each other as the board was already on fire just after the lunch break. Nakahara came out on top, but needed some clever defence to contain Fujii's dangerous looking counter attack.
For Nakahara the win meant that he still has some chances at promoting back to the A class with a 2-2 score and a high Junisen ranking. For Fujii the loss is quite painful, as he drops to 3-2 and a low Junisen ranking.
Miura will be happy with the loss of a promotion rival, as he is going straight for promotion with a 5-0 score after beating Kiriyama. At the moment there is not even a player with 4 wins, as Inoue lost to Minami. Closest rivals of Miura are now Minami and Fukuzaki (who did not play), both with 3-1 scores. Miura still has two tough games coming up against Goda and Minami, but I think that B1 is going to be a fight for the second promotion place this year as Miura will probably run away with first place.
Natural surprises in Junisen C1
In C1 the 4th round was supposed to be played, but because of terrible weather in the centre of Japan, travelling from Osaka was almost impossible and three games were cancelled.
Most important game was the one between Namekata and Sugimoto, as Namekata so far had a 2-0 score. The rain delay
was not the only surprise of the round as all leaders lost and Namekata is now (without playing) still the only player without a loss.
Nakata Hiroki was beaten by Katsumata, Nishimura was beaten by Kimura and Horiguchi Kazushiza lost to Sato Shuji, so these players all dropped back to 3-1. Good news for Yashiki, who jumped to the top of the table with a win over Ogura. Still a long time to go...
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