UK Draw With Top Team Poland

The 7th round of the B-League on 7th February saw the UK playing top-of-table team Poland. Andrew Simons played his game a week early to fit in with the schedule of his opponent, the European pro Mateusz Surma. On the night the rest of the team did well, with wins for Daniel Hu and Toby Jon Diamond, meaning the UK was the first team to take a point off the leaders with a draw. Both Italy and Austria won, total 12 points each (one behind Poland), and the UK were in fourth place with 10 points.

Andrew Simons wrote: Last week I unsurprisingly lost against Mateusz Surma, the new European pro. The opening was reasonable enough, with a big wall and counter-counter-pincer joseki, and to avoid him sacrificing on a small scale I made some attachment, which he resisted, resulting in a trade that I'd seen in pro games before. I got what I thought was a vital point turn in the centre and then pushed out, rather than connecting on dame. He played tenuki to a big point to negate my influence, so I got a nice cover but he plonked a stone in that moyo too. We each took some cash and then I attacked the weak group, but only chopped off a small part and my wall, that never connected on dame, suffered. As I was behind and short of time I played a few moves that didn't work and resigned.

Des Cann wrote: I had a decent game against Stanislaw Frejlak for the most part. I let him live in my corner in exchange for strength on one side and an attack on a weak group on the other. However I eventually committed to the attack too completely and some cutting stones fell off. I had no chance after that.

Daniel Hu wrote about his game that was last to end, attracting some 30 observers: A headache of a win against Koichiro Habu. I tried some AlphaGo imitation and it felt good, but playing with moyos is hard. I probably lost too much territory in the lower left for shape that was still weak. He invaded slightly deep, but somehow by some magic connected his two weak groups. He continued not bothering to make eyes, and I felt I had to put extra pressure on his group, taking lots of reading time, but I found he was already alive with the possibility of connecting on the first line to his corner! Luckily it seems he didn’t notice, and played tenuki when I threatened to cut off a 40+ point tail. It should have been an easy win, but my time was very tight, and I created another mess. Soon however I won on time.

Jon Diamond wrote: Well, that was a bit unfortunate - for my opponent Kamil Grabowski. I played several mis-steps in the middle game, so was pretty sure I was losing badly. Then he let me cut off some stones, which was part of a surround for my not-quite so alive corner. It cost him about 25 points, so he resigned. I guess he was only about 15 points behind, with some play left, but he was clearly dispirited by the loss.

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