A professional game

British Go Journal No. 11. March 1970. Page 6.

John Diamond.

This is an example of the invasion of centre territory, with a hard fight and two desperate ko battles. The game was played in 1966 in the Honinbo Challengers' League.

Black: Takeo Kajiwara, 9p
White: Shuko Fujisawa, 9p
Komi: 5½
The game-file in SGF format.

You might wish to open a second window beside the first one to view Fig 1 whilst reading the text in the first window.

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Figure 1 (1-100)

Diagram 1

• White 9: Joseki is to follow Dia 1, but against this White can play at 9 in Fig 1. The black stones in the upper left will form a useful foothold for black later.
• Black 13: The most common joseki is black at 19, white one point to the left of 9, black immediately above it, forming a ponnuki shape, and white one point further to the left of 9. The move played is most unusual.
• White 16: White builds a strong outside wall.
• Black 17: He must play lightly here. A play at A would be too heavy.
• White 22: Double hane, a tesuji and nearly always good.
• Black 25: Tesuji. A play at 26 leaves the group with a weakness at B. This tesuji occurs in many joseki, and might be remembered.
• Black 31: Black must play on the lower side, but not too near the formidable white wall. This move threatens a play at 32 or the severe attack on 30 which follows.
• Black 33: Large. Reduces whites area on the lower side.
• White 48: Trade. White increases his centre potential in exchange for the lower right corner.
• White 52: White strengthens his wall. 50 leaves possibilities for later (aji).
• White 56: White must now reduce the black moyo. Black must keep most of his territory and obtain outside influence - that is why he played 57 and 61. If white builds an outside wall in attacking blacks territory, his central area will be over 100 points and White will win easily.
• White 90: The outcome now depends on three things:
  Firstly, can Black save his two stones 37 and 73? If he can, then Whites group including 80 will be very weak.
  Secondly, can Black save his central group including 89? This will be hard.
  Thirdly, White should save his upper group including 90, but how much territory will he get in the centre? He cannot decide his strategy for this until the first point is decided.

Figure 2a (101-200) BGJ had Fig 2a and 2b as one diagram, Fig 2. 116 ko at , 119 ko at 111, 122 ko, 176 at 121.

• Black 113: Ko for the group. The ko is worth about forty points.
• White 126: The ko is temporarily forgotten as a ko threat turns into a vicious fight between the two groups.
• White 156: White wins the ko. The outcome of the fight is not completely clear. The white group has one eye and many liberties, the centre black group has one eye, but the upper left black group no eyes at all. A complicated position.
• Black 165: It is now obvious that the black group dies first in the struggle. This move leaves the white wall in the lower middle weak. Black must save his middle group to win and, by attacking the white wall, he may yet do so.
• Black 179: The last fight begins.
• White 190: The five white stones including 20 die before the black group in the corner.
• White 196: Another ko. Black has many ko threats in the upper left corner.

Figure 2b (201-252)
BGJ had Fig 2a and 2b as one diagram, Fig 2.



















204 ko at , 207 ko at 201, 210 ko, 213 ko, 216 ko, 219 ko, 222 ko, 225 ko, 228 ko, 231 ko, 234 ko, 237 ko, 240 ko, 243 ko, 246 ko, 249 ko, 252 ko.

• Black 247: Threatens a connection at 248.
• White 252: Black has no ko threats left. Although his central group lives the large loss in the upper left leaves him about 15 points behind without many opportunities to pull back.

Black resigns.

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This article is from the British Go Journal Issue 11
which is one of a series of back issues now available on the web.

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