Australian Go Journal » World Championships

The 10th World Students Go Oza Championship wants YOU

aguido — Thu, 20 Oct 2011 07:20:52 +0000

…at least, if you are a student at an Australian, New Zealand or African university who can play in the regional preliminary tournament on IGS and can be in Tokyo from 27 February to 2 March 2012 for the world finals. Citizenship in a country in the Oceania or African IGF regions would be good, too, and it would be helpful if your national go association has at least heard of you.

This year’s representative from Oceania was Jimmy Yuan from New Zealand, and in 2010 we sent Mile Gu, who liveblogged the whole thing.

More details at the tournament page. Register for the regional qualifiers with this form. Remember, the deadline for registration is 30 October. Pass the word along….

Joanne Missingham 1p advances to finals of Bingsheng Cup in China

aguido — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 12:32:41 +0000

Word has just come in that Joanne Missingham has been representing Oceania in the Bingsheng Cup, the first annual world women’s tournament in Qionglong Mountain, Suzhou over the last three days; the last round of the knock-out tournament is tomorrow. In the rounds so far she has defeated Aoki Kikuyo 8p (Japan), Li He 3p (China), and Zheng Yan 2p (China) , both of the latter considered among the top female Chinese players. Tomorrow in the final (15:30 AEST, if I’m reading this correctly) she goes up against Pak Chi Eun 9p from South Korea, who according to sources at the AGA is regarded as the top female go player in the world. The Journal understands that Joanne actually won the qualifying tournament to represent Taiwan, only to be informed by the tournament organisers that she should represent Australia instead.

Joanne Missingham storms into the finals (h/t sports.sina.com.cn)

Unfortunately I cannot read Chinese, but those of you who can please feel free to look at the original story and correct me forcefully in the comments. :)

Developing…

[Embedded SGF File: Joanne's game in round one against Aoki Kikuyo 8p] [Embedded SGF File: Joanne's game in the quarter finals against Li He 3p] [Embedded SGF File: Joanne's game in the semifinals against Zheng Yan 2p]

Correction: Larry Wen has helpfully pointed out I had the wrong name for the other finalist.

Update 15/9/2010:Joanne played as white against Pak Chi Eun 9p and lost, so comes second overall in the tournament. Kudos to her on a very strong result, nonetheless…

[Embedded SGF File: The final game of the tournament]

Update: Larry Wen has helpfully pointed out the correct name for the tournament, whereupon I was able to actually find the Sensei’s Library page for it.

Second prize is a big, *big* cheque.

Australasia at the thirty-first WAGC

aguido — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 07:11:23 +0000

The thirty-first World Amateur Go Championships this year was held in Hangzhou, China in the last eight days of May. David Ormerod 5d represented Australia, and placed thirtieth in the results as reported in Ranka, with victories against Costa Rica in the first round, Spain in the second round, Norway in the fifth round, and Thailand in the seventh round. Kaikun Xie 3d represented New Zealand and placed thirty-third, with victories against Mongolia in the first round, Lithuania in the fourth round, Norway in the sixth round, and Spain in the eighth round.

This is David’s first game against Daniel Vargas Campos 5k of Costa Rica, with comments by Younggil An 9p, one of his teachers:

[Embedded SGF File]

This is David’s second round game against Antonio Egea Diaz 3d of Spain, again with comments:

[Embedded SGF File]

Ranka mentioned “a strong challenge” from David to the USA’s Thomas Hsiang 7d in the seventh round, which, alas, did not quite come off.

[Embedded SGF File]

Oceania eliminated in first round at World Pair Go Cup

aguido — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 11:56:38 +0000

The final results of today’s Pair Go 20th Anniversary World Cup are now up on the web. Cathy Zhang 6d and Yiming Guo 7d (representing Australia and New Zealand) were eliminated by Chinese Taipei (Joanne Missingham 1p and Chun-Hsun Chou 9p) in the opening round. Here is the kifu:

[Embedded SGF File]

Teams from the People’s Republic of China took first and third place, with Korea taking second place in the final.

World Pair Go Tournament features 3 Aussies beating other.

Mile Gu — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 16:28:22 +0000

Its worth noting that the World Pair Go Cup in Hangzhou officially begins tomorrow, where Australian is represented by Cathy Zhang and Yiming Guo. Its a four round elimination tournament, and the detailed matchups are available here. Ironically, our first match-up happens to be against Joanne Missingham, Brisbane born, and alas, representing Taiwan is the tournament. The match-up should at least be fun to watch. It’ll be broadcasted live today at 11am Australian time on IGS. So if you’ve got Sunday morning spare, log-in, at least one Aussie is guaranteed to win.

Mile Gu will play in the World Students Go Oza for Oceania

aguido — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 12:03:12 +0000

On the twelfth of December, Mile Gu from Auckland and Matthew Crossman from Brisbane played a game on IGS to determine who goes to the eighth World Students Go Oza Championship this year. The game was even, with Mile taking black and Matthew taking white:

White resigned at that point. Mile Gu will represent Australia and New Zealand in the championships on the second and third of March in Japan.

WPGA Pair Go World Cup

aguido — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 19:46:23 +0000

The World Pair Go Association is holding a Pair Go World Cup to mark the twentieth anniversary of modern pair go. The tournament itself is in Hangzhou, China, from the 20th to the 23rd of March, 2010. Oceania (Australia and New Zealand) have been invited to send a pair, accommodation and travel paid. The Australian Go Association invites expressions of interest from pairs of players (male and female) to represent Oceania; please make these to your nearest club or national association. If more than one pair makes itself known to the AGA and NZGS, there will be playoffs held on the Pandanet Internet Go Server. We want as many as possible.

The WPGA would like us to select a representative by the end of January. We are looking to close expressions of interest by 8 January and hold playoffs circa 23 January. These dates will vary depending on what comes in. Tournament details and prize money are here.

Oceania playoff for WSGO representative

aguido — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 11:43:52 +0000

The representative from Australian and New Zealand to the 2010 World Students Go Oza championship in Japan will be determined by a playoff between Mile Gu and Matthew Crossman on December the twelfth, on IGS. More details as they come to hand.

Australia sponsors gift to World Pair Go Association stalwarts

aguido — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 13:21:34 +0000

On November 15, Neville Smythe attended the closing ceremony of the 20th World Pair Go Championship in Tokyo. IGF vice-president Thomas Hsiang presented Mr Taki Hisao (inventor of pair go) and Mrs Taki Hiroko (major force behind the Japanese Pair Go Association), with a plaque “with appreciation from the World Pair Go community” but specifically signed by the American Go Association, the European Go Federation, the Ibero-American Go Federation, the Canadian Go Association and the Australian Go Association.

The Australian Go Association by prior invitation contributed substantially to the cost of the plaque, in “deep appreciation of (their) pioneering effort and leadership in the development of pair go”. Mrs Taki was reported to be very happy indeed.

New Zealand beats Australia at 2009 Korean Prime Ministers Cup

aguido — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 10:34:37 +0000

The results of the fourth Korean Prime Ministers Cup this week are in. Xuqi Wi 3d of New Zealand took twelfth place with five victories in seven rounds. Yiming Guo 7d of Australia came nineteenth with four victories, out of a field of sixty-six countries.

Xuqi Wi lost to Zoran Mutabzija 5d of Croatia, defeated Sebastien Ott 1d of Switzerland, Charlie Akerblom 4d of Sweden, Sin-Voon Chin 2d of Brunei, Cesar Sanchez Munoz 4d of Spain and Dusan Mitic 5d of Serbia, and lost to Yuan Zhou 7d of the United States in his final round, to score 5 points, 27 points SOS, and 190 points SOSOS. Zhou subsequently placed fifth in the competition, so not a bad player to be defeated by.

Yiming Guo defeated Ott and Ruechagorn Trairatananusorn 5d of Thailand, lost to Chun-Yen Lin 6d of Taiwan, defeated Ralph Spiegl 5d of Australia, lost to Cristian Pop 7d of Romania, defeated Wan-Kao Lou 5d of Macau, and lost to Victor Chow 7d of South Africa to score 4 points, 28 points SOS, and 197 points SOSOS.

Congratulations to both representatives for a strong showing, and thanks to Sensei’s Library for a proper English translation of the official results, and Jayden Sia for the photos.

Eighth World Students Go Oza wants an Oceania representative

aguido — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 09:32:53 +0000

If you’re a strong go player and full-time university student under thirty years old, please have a go at the eighth World Students Go Oza happening in March 2010 in Japan. Unlike the previous seven, this one has a slot for a player from Oceania (i.e. Australia and New Zealand and the islands) and a qualifying tournament for same (played on IGS). Registrations for the tournament are reported as closing on Sunday the twenty-fifth of October (or not: updated below).

Word has already been sent to most Australian go clubs. But the qualifying round needs at least ten games played in it, with no doubling up, which means at least five players, and if there are a lot of players from one region, they will adjust the slots for competitors accordingly, possibly upward. If you know anyone who fits the bill, please make sure they know about this before Sunday.

Update: according to Keiko Sota from Pandanet, the deadline is now November 12th for the Oceania contestants to register for the preliminaries in December.

Bits and pieces

aguido — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 09:36:48 +0000

Some of the Perth go players will be meeting on the first Sunday of every month at Clive Hunt’s place from the fifth of July. Play starts from two in the afternoon, more details closer to the date. If you want to RSVP, contact Clive at clivehunt@bigpond.com or 0415-619046.
The NSW State Championships have just finished. Does anybody have any kifu or anecdotes or photos from the tournament they would like to share? Send them in and we’ll blog ‘em.
The Australia Room Friendly Series on KGS has its second fixture on Sunday the fifth of July 2009: Sydney vs Brisbane. Both cities have the core of a team, although Sydney’s is at this point stronger. If you want to play, contact David Mitchell (Sydney) or Horatio Davis (Brisbane). If you’re in Melbourne or Adelaide and want to join in the fun, put a team together and scribble down a claim to a month on the SL wiki page. Currently Adelaide leads the table with two points, with Brisbane in second place on half a point. All other cities are equal last on zero points. :)
The biennial Toyota and Denso Cup World Go Oza, including the Brisbane qualifying tournament has been cancelled as the sponsors aren’t going to support it any more. Rumours have been going around for several days on various forums; the Australian Go Association has just been formally notified. The fifth tournament was going to be next year. If you have any suggestions for what to replace it with, please do tell the AGA…

Thirteenth and twenty-first

aguido — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 05:13:35 +0000

At the end of the thirtieth World Amateur Go Championships on Saturday, the Australian representative David He 7d of New South Wales placed thirteenth with five wins and three losses (sum of opponents scores 39), and the New Zealand representative Longyang Li 4d placed twenty-first with the same record (but an SOS of 33). David lost his fifth round game against Juyong Koh 7d of Canada, won the sixth against Dimas Cabre Chacon 4d from Spain, won the seventh against Paisal Thunthaduluk 4d from Thailand, and lost the last against Korea’s Shin-wan Yoo 6d. Longyang in his last four rounds won against against Israel and Hungary, and lost one of the remaining rounds.

IGF Oceania director Neville Smythe was on the spot, and has posted some pictures (above). He wrote at the time:

David was disappointed to lose by 0.5 to Singapore, he was 10 points ahead for until near the end when Tan pulled off something desperate. He also lost to Canada after a good game; the Canadians always seem to be our nemesis (and I’m afraid he may also be losing at the moment to Thailand, and I think he must be feeling discouraged). LongYang Li from NZ had a very good win against Hungary, who had beaten USA.

Shortly after this, David He did indeed pull off a win against his Thai opponent, leaving him to face the second-placing player in the tournament. China took first place, and Hong Kong third, with Finland’s Antti Tormanen taking the Shizuo Asada Fighting Spirit Prize. Full results are posted by the Nihon Ki-in here, kifu of selected interesting games here.

Halfway through the 2009 WAGC

aguido — Thu, 28 May 2009 10:54:31 +0000

…and the Australian representative is in equal seventeenth place out of sixty-six players. David He 7d of New South Wales lost to Jia Cheng Tan 6d of Singapore in the third (morning) round on day two of the thirtieth World Amateur Go Championships, and defeated Matt Cocke 5d of the United Kingdom in the fourth round this afternoon. Meanwhile, Longyang Li 4d of New Zealand lost to Santiago Andres Tabares 3d of Argentina in the third round and defeated Cristiano Garbarini 1d of Italy in the fifth round, to end up in forty-fourth place on the leader board.

Meanwhile, the IGF director from Oceania, Neville Smythe, has popped up among the audience at Shizuoka and engaged in na side game with Shiratori Sumiko 5p. Five handicap stones and 255 moves later, it was white’s game by six points. Review by Michael Redmond 9p and the SGF game record in conveniently viewable form at the Ranka blog entry.

Australian representative wins first two games at WAGC

aguido — Wed, 27 May 2009 10:51:06 +0000

After day one of the 30th World Amateur Go Championships, David He 7d from Australia is in sixteenth place out of sixty-six players (thirteen players are occupying third place at the moment). In the first (morning round) he won against Turkey’s Fatih Sulak 2d. In the second (afternoon) round he defeated Anh Tuan Tran 2d from Vietnam. New Zealand’s Longyang Li 4d won his first round game against Edgardo Carceres Estrada 7k and lost to Gheorghe Cornel Burzo 6d of Romania, to place twentieth along with 26 other players. There are six more rounds to go.

2009 World Amateur Go Championships

aguido — Sat, 16 May 2009 06:52:49 +0000

The thirtieth World Amateur Go Championship this year will be eight rounds played from Wednesday the twenty-third to Saturday the twenty-ninth of May in Fukuroi, Japan. Australia’s representative is David He 7d of New South Wales, who was the 2007 Australian champion. David is profiled in this week’s American Go Association E-Journal. The Australian Go Journal will be following how he goes, and reporting it here.

Ranka Online has the tournament announcement and will be covering the championships in depth.