Hello everyone - I've been improving quickly for the last few months, but I've been stuck at 8k long enough to justify asking for advice... So, if anyone can review a game of mine, I'd appreciate it. I played as white against a 9k and lost by a small margin.

Specifically, I'd like advice about the following things, as well as having any other mistakes pointed out to me:

I think I didn't get enough use out of my upper-right thickness after move 30 and I didn't get much profit from attacking the floating group that appeared around move 50 - could I have gotten more and how?
Also, I somehow felt that the upper-left black framework was not very sturdy, but my attempt to exploit it by invading the corner ended up looking clumsy, is there a better way?
After the game, I noticed we both missed a killing sequence at 170, but I can't see any other reading errors - did I miss anything big?
Also, I think I might be too reluctant to tenuki, how can I judge this better?

A few ideas:

For W14, I like Ed's variation better than the game, but I like the idea of the counter-pincer here better than the pressing move.

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$c
$$ ---------------------------------------
$$ |. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .|
$$ |. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .|
$$ |. . . . . O . 1 . 4 . 8 . . . . . . .|
$$ |. . . X . . . . . , . . . . . O . . .|
$$ |. . . . . 2 . 5 . 7 . . . . . . . . .|
$$ |. . . 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .|
$$ |. . . . . 6 . . . . . . . . . . . . .|
$$ |. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .|
$$ |. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .|
$$ |. . . , . . . . . , . . . . . , . . .|
$$ |. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .|
$$ |. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .|
$$ |. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .|
$$ |. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . O . . .|
$$ |. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .|
$$ |. . . , . . . . . , . . . . . O . . .|
$$ |. . . X . . . . . . X . . X . . O . .|
$$ |. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . X . . .|
$$ |. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .|
$$ ---------------------------------------[/go]

Any thoughts?

(a): 407 games; (b): 65 games (from a database of 50,744):

Click Here To Show Diagram Code

[go]$$
$$ ----------------------
$$ |. . . . . . . . . . .
$$ |. . . . . . . . . . .
$$ |. . . . . O . 1 . b .
$$ |. . . X . . . . a , .
$$ |. . . . . 2 . . . . .
$$ |. . . 3 . . . . . . .
$$ |. . . . . . . . . . .[/go]

Well, can't go just by the blind numbers; certainly the location and color of the stone in the top-right corner affects the decision at the very least.


I prefer the press joseki with a friendly stone in that corner, especially if it's low. If I don't like the press joseki I tend to jump into the corner rather than run out to the center. IMO, W8 Definitely looks too easy on black with such an open board here. I'd be more interested in how the choice between a and b varies with the progression on the rest of the board. To be specific, I wonder how often b is played when this sequence occurs early in the game versus later in the game.

_________________
Keep in mind, I am frequently wrong.

Hmmm...


Thoughts?

No idea; thus the reference to pro databases for possible research.

I hadn't thought very hard about the joseki, but thank you for the comments.