History of Topics 2009

  On 15 October, Iyama Yuta 8-dan won the fifth game of the 34th Meijin title match. This completed a four-game winning streak against Cho U, so he won the match 4-1, becoming the youngest Meijin in tournament history. Iyama is barely out of his teens, being 20 years four months old. The previous record was held by Rin Kaiho, Honorary Tengen, who won the Meijin title in 1965 at the age of 23. Iyama also just managed to set a new record for the youngest player to hold a top-seven title - the previous one was held by Cho Chikun, who won the 24th Oza title at the age of 20 years five months). Since Iyama earned an automatic promotion to 9-dan, he also became the youngest 9-dan ever in Japan. The previous record was set by Cho U when he won the Honinbo title at the age of 23 in 2003 and was promoted to 9-dan.
  The second game of the match was held at the Hotel Nikko Kumamoto in Kumamoto City on 16 and 17 September. The challenger outplayed Cho U Meijin in the decisive middle-game fight and evened the score.
  In the third game, held at the Takarazuka Hotel in Takarazuka City, Hyogo Prefecture, on 24 and 25 September, Cho, who is renowned for his ko expertise, made an uncharacteristic mistake in a ko fight that he had started. That turned out to be fatal: Cho attacked fiercely in an attempt to catch up, but Iyama coolly parried the attacks though in byo-yomi. Cho finally resigned after 246 moves.
  The fourth game was played at the Saryo Soen, a luxury Japanese inn in Sendai City, Miyagi Prefecture, on 7 and 8 October. Like the previous three games, it featured spectacular fighting full of original moves. Playing black, Iyama took the initiative and forced Cho on the defensive. Eventually the pressure became too much for White to bear and he was forced to resignaiton after 159 moves.
  The fifth game was held at the Atami Sekitei inn in Atami City, Shizuoka Prefecture, on 14 and 15 October. Taking white, Iyama played a relatively new move early in the opening that upset Cho's plans and helped Iyama get off to a good start. He took more territory than the usually territorial Cho and put him under a lot of pressure. Already on the first day the game seemed to tilt in his favour. On the second day, Iyama skillfully looked after two weak groups and kept a secure hold on the initiative, so Cho was unable to chip away at his lead. The game finished at 4:48 p.m., with Cho resigning after 176 moves.
  Cho freely admitted that he had been outplayed by Iyama. 'Iyama played moves that were better than I had expected, and I felt once again how strong he is. This game was clearly bad for me from the first day; around the sealed move, the more I looked at the board, the worse it looked for me. I felt that Iyama was cleverly outplaying me.' Cho's quintuple crown is now down to four titles.

Full results:

Game 1 (3, 4 September). Cho (B) by half a point. Game 2 (16, 17 September). Iyama (B) by resignation. Game 3 (24, 25 September). Iyama (W) by resignation. Game 4 (7, 8 October). Iyama (B) by resignation. Game 5 (14, 15 October). Iyama (W) by resignation.

  The final of the 18th Ryusei Cup was telecast on the same day that the third game of the Meijin title match was decided, though it was actually played before the match began. The games featured the same pairing and both were won by Iyama Yuta 8-dan.
  Cho U has a strong affinity with this title, having reached the final six times; this year's was his fifth in a row and he has won the title twice. Iyama was making his debut in the final.
  Cho drew white and played with typical verve, taking the lead in the middle game. However, Iyama went all out in the late middle game and managed to pull off an upset. Playing black, he won by 3.5 points.

  There was no rest for the defeated champion. The day after losing his Meijin title, a Friday, Cho U had to travel from Atami to Kyoto to play in the final of the 16th Agon Kiriyama Cup, held on Saturday the 17th at the headquarters of the Agon Sect. Here, too, he was unsuccessful. Playing white, Hane Naoki Honinbo (W) won the game by resignation. Cho was in the unusual position of having lost three title play-offs in rapid succession.
  Top prizes are ten million and five million yen. Hane will represent Japan in the play-off with the winner of the Chinese Agon Kiriyama title.

  The first round of the 14th Samsung Masters Cup was held in Taejon City from 10 to 12 September. It took three days to finish the round because there had been a major change in the tournament system, to go with the addition of 'Masters' to the name. The 32 players appearing in Round 1 were divided into eight groups of four, and the players in each group played each other until two players have scored two wins.
  The tournament reverted to its regular knock-out mode in the second round and the quarterfinals, held on 13 and 14 October. Three Chinese and one Korean have made it to the best-of-three semifinals, which are scheduled for 2, 4, and 5 November.
  For Round 1 below, we give the results only of the Japanese players. Although only three played in the tournament, two of them had the bad luck to be drawn in the same group.

Round 1

(10 September)   Yuki Satoshi 9-dan (B) beat Qiu Jun 8-dan (China) by resig.   Yamashita Keigo 9-dan (W) beat Ch'oe Kyu-pyeong 9-dan (Korea) by 4.5 points. Song T'ae-kon 9-dan (Korea) (B) beat Hane Naoki 9-dan by resig.

(11 September)   Kim Chi-seok 6-dan (Korea) (B) beat Hane by resig.   Yamashita (B) beat Yuki by resig.

(12 September)   Qiu (W) beat Yuki by resig.

Second round

(13 October)   Pak Yeong-hun 9-dan (Korea) (W) beat Wang Yao 6-dan (China) by half a point.   Kong Jie 9-dan (B) beat Yamashita Keigo on time.   Gu Li 9-dan (China) (W) beat Chang Hao 9-dan (China) by resignation.   Yi Ch'ang-ho 9-dan (Korea) (B) beat Ding Wei 9-dan (China) by resignation.   Heo Yeong-ho 7-dan (Korea) (B) beat Zhou Heyang 9-dan (China) by resignation.   Zhou Ruiyang 5-dan (China) (B) beat Liu Xing 7-dan (China) by resignation.   Chen Yaoye 9-dan (China) (W) beat Ch'oe Ch'eol-han 9-dan (Korea) by 5.5 points.   Qiu Jun 8-dan (China) (W) beat Song T'ae-kon 9-dan (Korea) by 2.5 points.

Quarterfinals

(14 October)   Gu (B) beat Chen by resignation.   Kong (W) beat Pak by resignation.   Yi (B) beat Zhou by half a point.   Qiu (W) beat Heo by resignation.

  The first round of the 8th Cheongkwanjang Cup, an international women's team tournament, was held in Guangzhou, China, from 22 to 25 September. A new star emerged for China, with the 18-year-old Wang Chenxing 2-dan winning the first three games. In the fourth, Aoki Kikuyo put a stop to her winning run.

  In the first game of the 28th Women's Honinbo title match, held on 1 October, Aoki Kikuyo 8-dan, the challenger, made a good start, forcing Xie Yimin 4-dan (B) to resignaiton. However, the defending champion made a comeback in the second game and evened the score. Playing white, she won by resignation on 9 October. The third game of the best-of-five will be played on 21 October.

  O Rissei won the A League in the fourth round when he defeated Yoda Norimoto in their game on 10 September. O had a low rank, 4th, in the league, but this win took him to 4-0 and every other player had at least two losses.
  Cho U faltered in the fourth round, losing to Kono Rin, but after the third round he was in the fortunate position of needing to win only one of his remaining two games to win the league. He picked up the requisite win in the final round. Incidentally, all six games in the final round were played on the same day.
  The play-off between O and Cho will be held on 16 November.

Recent results
10 September
B League	Kono Rin 9-dan (B) beat Cho U Meijin by resignation. Akiyama Jiro 8-dan (W) beat 25th Honinbo (Cho) Chikun by resignation. Iyama Yuta 8-dan (W) beat Miyazawa Goro 9-dan by resignation.
17 September
A League	O Rissei 9-dan (W) beat Yoda Norimoto 9-dan by half a point.
10 ctober
A League	O Rissei 9-dan (W) beat Ri Ishu 7-dan by 1.5 points. Hane Naoki Honinbo (W) beat Kiyonari Tetsuya 9-dan by resignation. Yoda Norimoto 9-dan (B) beat Takao Shinji 9-dan by half a point.
B League	Cho U Meijin (B) beat Miyazawa Goro 9-dan by resignation. Akiyama Jiro 8-dan (W) beat Iyama Yuta 8-dan by 4.5 points. Kono Rin 9-dan (W) beat 25th Honinbo Chikun by half a point.

in the chart

* B=playing black   * 1=win, 0=loss

The 34th Kisei League

  The play-off to decide the challenger for the 56th Oza title was held on 10 September. Yamada Kimio 9-dan (B) defeated Yoda Norimoto 9-dan by resignation, so he will challenge Cho U for the title. Yamada won the 45th Oza title in 1997.
  Yamada will be the third player from the Kansai area (western Honshu, centring on Osaka) to lay siege to Cho U's five-storey citadel, following Yuki Satoshi, who failed to take the Gosei title from him, and Iyama Yuta, who had more success in the Meijin title. Cho looks vulnerable, so this is certainly the time to strike.
  For a number of years, Yamada has enjoyed excellent form, doing consistently well in leagues, for example, but he has fallen just short of becoming challenger. He has an affinity with the Oza title, as it is the only top-seven title he has won, so he will be eager to make the most of this opportunity.
  Yoda has a sad record in Oza play-offs: he has now appeared in six of them and has yet to make a challenge for the title.

  Yamashita Keigo has a strong attachment to the Tengen title and has played in five of the last six title matches. However, his success rate is not very good: he has won only one of those matches.
  In the play-off to decide the challenger to Cho U for the 35th Tengen title, held on 17 September, he faced a player with an equally strong attachment and a better record: Kono Rin, who has won three out of the last four Tengen titles. Before losing the title to Cho U last year, Kono had beaten Yamashita three years in a row in the title match.
  This time Yamashita was able to take some revenge. Playing white, Yamashita forced Kono to resignaiton and so won the right to have another crack at the title. However, he also has a bad record against Cho U, having scored 17 wins to 28 losses and having won only one of the five title matches they have met in. This is his chance to redress the balance.
  The first game will be played on 12 November.

  Ri Ishu 5-dan suddenly became one of the favourites in this tournament when he won a place in a Kisei league in March; he was promoted to 7-dan for that feat, which meant that this was his last chance to win the King of the New Stars, which is restricted to players under 7-dan.
  In the final, Ri defeated Mitani Tetsuya 5-dan 2-0.

Game 1  (16 September).
  Ri (W) by 1.5 points.
Game 2  (25 September).
  Ri (B) by resignation.

  was the first to post her third win, but she also has one loss. The only undefeated player, Suzuki Ayumi 4-dan, played her first game for quite a while on 15 October. She picked up a win, so, with her second-place ranking, she remains the favourite.
  Results since our last report are given below.

(8 September)	Chinen Kaori 4-dan (W) beat Umezawa Yukari 5-dan by resignation.
(17 September)	Mukai Chiaki 2-dan (B) beat Yoshida Mika 8-dan by resignation.
(1 October)	Kato Keiko 6-dan (B) beat Okuda Aya 2-dan by resignation.
(8 October)	Mukai Chiaki 3-dan (B) beat Chinen Kaori 4-dan by resignation.
(15 October)	Suzuki Ayumi 4-dan (W) beat Kato Keiko 6-dan by resignation.

  To date, only two games have been played in the new Honinbo league. On 1 October, Yamashita Keigo Kisei (W) beat Yamada Kimio 9-dan by resignation in the opening game of the league. The following week, on 8 October, Mimura Tomoyasu 9-dan (B) put a dent in six-time Honinbo Takemiya Masaki's triumphant comeback to the league by defeating him by 4.5 points.

in the chart

* B = playing black, W = playing white   * 1 = win, 0 = loss   * Date: mm/dd

The 65th Honinbo League

  A large-scale typhoon attacked Tokyo on the night of Wednesday, 7 October, and Thursday morning, playing havoc with to the morning rush hour on the trains. That was good news for school and college students, who benefitted from cancelled classes, but not for workers, who had to make an effort to get to work by whatever train lines were running.
  Among the latter were go professionals, for whom Thursday is the main playing day. It was presumably too late for games to be rescheduled. Current tournament rules give players leeway of only one hour for late arrivals, after which they forfeit the game. Time deducted from the time allowance up to one hour is also tripled.
  Games start at 10 a.m. Mimura Tomoyasu was 14 minutes late for his Honinbo League game, but he still managed to win it. In more serious trouble was Cho Chikun, who lives in Chiba Prefecture, next to Tokyo. When his usual train stopped, he switched to a number of different lines and somehow made it to Ichigaya just before 11. His troubles weren't over, however, as he thought his game was being played on the 6th floor, the main playing venue for professionals. Actually it was scheduled for the special playing room on the 7th floor. Cho had taken his shoes off for the Japanese-style playing room on the 6th floor; when he realized his mistake, he rushed up barefooted to the Western-style 7th floor. He made it with just three minutes left on his clock. Nothing daunted, he played the game in byo-yomi and won it. (His opponent was Kono Takayuki 7-dan, and the game was in Preliminary A of the Tengen tournament.)
  Surprisingly, there were only four forfeits in 41 games.

  The play-off of the Winners's Section of the 48th Judan tournament was held on 15 October. Takao Shinji 9-dan (B) beat O Rissei 9-dan by 10.5 points. Takao gains a place in the play-off to decide the challenger, while O has to switch to the semifinal of the Losers' Section, where he will play Yamashita Keigo Kisei. The pairing in the other semifinal is Shudo Shun 6-dan vs. Ri Ishu 7-dan.

The play-off to decide the challenger for the 50th Okan (Crown) title, which is limited to players at the Nagoya Branch of the Nihon Ki-in, was held on 8 October. Yamashiro Hiroshi 9-dan (W) beat Ogata Masaki 9-dan by resignation. He will challenge Hane Naoki Honinbo for the second year in a row.

  There has been a surge of promotions, in fact, the most we can remember in such a relatively short period since the new promotion system came into effect.

  To 9-dan: Iyama Yuta (for winning the Meijin title)
  To 8-dan: Kono Mitsuki (150 wins)
  To 6-dan: Kurotaki Masaki, Koyama Terumi (90 wins)
  To 4-dan: Osawa Narumi (50 wins)
  To 2-dan: Kanazawa Makoto (30 wins)

(10 September)   Michael Redmond 9-dan (W) beat Kanazawa Hideo 7-dan by resignation (Preliminary A, 36th Tengen tournament).

(14 September)   Kanazawa Makoto 1-dan (W) beat Michael Redmond 9-dan by resig. (Preliminary B, 23rd Fujitsu Cup).

(15 October)   Redmond (W) beat Nakamura Shinya 8-dan by resignation (Preliminary A, 36th Tengen tournament).

  Tono Masaharu 9-dan of the Kansai Ki-in died of heart failure on 7 September. Born on 12 April 1942 in Aichi Prefecture, Tono became a disciple of Hashimoto Utaro 9-dan. He became shodan in 1959 and reached 9-dan this year. Tono Hiroaki is his older brother.