From: Reijer Grimbergen ETL GO JP> Date: 10 dec 1997 Subject: This week in Shukan Shogi (no. 716, December 12th 1997) This week Shukan Shogi opens with the final of the JT Series between Tanigawa and Moriuchi. In this tournament the 12 strongest players (all title holders and A-class players) play a knock-out quick game tournament all over Japan in front of large audiences. This year the final of the 18th tournament was played in Fukuoka. Tanigawa had set a new record last year by winning it for the the fourth time, while Moriuchi appeared in the final for the first time after beating Habu in the semifinal. It was a tough game where Tanigawa's lightning endgame speed technique had to save him, thereby extending his record to five wins. His next aim he made already clear. He wants to win this tournament three years in a row to get even with Goda, who did the same a couple of years ago. More important than this cigarette tournament is the Osho league where the challenger of Habu will be decided very soon. Last week no less than five games were played and the situation has gotten a little clearer. Instead of of the possibility that all seven players would end up with a 3-3 score, we now have four players left: Sato Yasumitsu, Tanigawa, Maruyama and Nakahara. Sato scored a come-from-behind win against Murayama and three days later a very important against Maruyama to be the only player with 5-1. He has his chances in his own hands, but because of his low position in the class, he is even in danger of missing out on the play-off if he loses the final game against Takahashi. In the Osho league only the top two players play a play-off game in case of a tie for first place. It is almost certain that Maruyama will end up with a 5-2 score, since his final round opponent Murayama is again struggling with health problems and already had to forfeit his game against Tanigawa last week. Since Tanigawa plays Nakahara in the final round either of them will also end up with a 5-2 score. Complicated? Yes, this year's Osho league is extremely tight. On the 15th the situation will become clear(er). In the Kisei two Lifetime Kisei played against each other. However, Nakahara and Yonenaga played only once in an actual Kisei title match in 1980. This time it was Yonenaga who judged the position better and won, starting well in group C of the pre-round groups. Best two players of the round-robin four player group qualify for the knock-out to decide the challenger of Yashiki. Tamura had to play two days in a row in the 6th group of the Ryu-O, but that is no problem for the fastest player in professional Shogi. He won both against Ikeda and Sekine. In his game against Sekine he used only 53 minutes and 30 minutes were a penalty because he arrived ten minutes late for the game. Reijer -- Reijer Grimbergen Electrotechnical Laboratory 1-1-4 Umezono Tsukuba-shi, Ibaraki-ken 305 JAPAN E-mail: grimberg etl go jp WWW: http://www.etl.go.jp:8080/etl/suiron/~grimberg Tel: +81-(0)298-54-3316 Fax: +81-(0)298-54-5918