From: Reijer Grimbergen ETL GO JP> Date: 21 aug 1996 Subject: This week in Shukan Shogi (no. 649, August 21st 1996) Well, one thing is certain after last week: this year there is not going to be a new Ryu-O. In the semi-finals Sato Yasumitsu (former Ryu-O) played Takahashi and Tanigawa (also former Ryu-O) played Moriuchi. Both former Ryu-O title holders won their games. Sato won his game against the odds, because he lost the furigoma and had to play white. Last season Sato had the highest winning percentage with black of all professionals at 87.5% but his performance with white was rather mediocre at 41.9%. Sato played B3c yokofudori and this resulted in a very difficult middle game (as this variation so often does). One mistake often decides the outcome and it was Takahashi who made it. In the other semifinal Tanigawa wanted to bounce back from the big loss against Shima in the challenger final of the Oza and did. Tanigawa, winning the furigoma, played the rather unusual 1.P7f P8d 2.S6h P3d 3.B7g and tried to match that with a very fast climbing silver attack. However, his attack came to quick and this strategic oversight quickly cost him the game. Sato and Tanigawa will now play a very interesting looking best-of-three match to decide the challenger of Habu. First game: August 29th. In the A-junisen the last remaining game of the second round was played between Moriuchi and Shima. This game was to decide who would become the only player in the A-class to lose both of his first two games. Shima, having white, bravely chose the Yagura, even though white lately has big problems with this opening (last season 55.9% of the Yagura games ended in a black win). Shima could not prove the statistics wrong and had to sacrifice a knight in the early middle game. In return, he got a very mean looking attack, but Moriuchi defended very coolly and managed to neutralise all threats. After that he could cash in his extra material. Only two rounds played, but Shima is already in trouble. This is his third year in the A and his scores in his previous years (4-5 and 5-4) are not very encouraging. Well, I am afraid there is not much else in Shukan Shogi this week. For those of you who have no access to the WWW or forgot that you could follow the 4th game of the Oi live, I can tell you that Habu won the fourth game to go up 3-1 in this match. Reijer -- Reijer Grimbergen Electrotechnical Laboratory Palcious Tsukuba 302 1-1-4 Umezono 1-24-8 Ninomiya Tsukuba-shi, Ibaraki-ken Tsukuba-shi, Ibaraki-ken 305 JAPAN 305 JAPAN E-mail: grimberg etl go jp Tel: 0298-59-1606 WWW: http://www.etl.go.jp:8080/etl/suiron/~grimberg Tel: +81-(0)298-54-5080 extension: 67431 Fax: +81-(0)298-58-5918