This is going to be a little amorphous. It's really just a case of jotting down random thoughts resulting from some stuff I was reading this afternoon.

The reason I picked up on it is that I find extremely tiresome a strain of thought that seems to be not uncommon in Europe. In hyperbolic essence this is: the Korean 7-dan amateurs are Masters of the Universe. Compared to them, Japanese 9-dans are morons. Since we have played these Korean 7-dans and have won the occasional game, we must be the bee's knees, too, and Japanese pros hold no fears for us. This is compounded by the (to me) infantile rejection of the entire body of Japanese pros just because a few Korean or Chinese pros happen to be at the top at the moment.

Naturally, I am not denying that Korean 7-dans are strong or that they can make the blood of young pros in Japan run cold, or that China and Japan are top dogs now. As I said, I am exaggerating - though not that much - but I think readers here will know what I am referring to. It is lack of a balanced perspective of the whole go scene. I hope there are others who also find it tiresome enough for me to share these thoughts.

Anyway, what brought that on was reading a report of the Amateur Meijin in Japan. Two of these Masters of the Universe contested the final of the challengers' knockout. Ha Seong-pong, a winner of the WAGC, overcame Kim Seong-chin, who is now training to be a pro in the Kansai Ki-in. But, in the final, Ha was defeated by last year's winner, a Japanese, Tsuneishi Takashi. That's not supposed to happen, is it?

Furthermore, a longish commentary on the Ha-Kim game by Kobayashi Satoru, a mere Japanese 9-dan admittedly, was headed "Pro tactics, amateur hallucinations". "Amateur hallucinations" is a slightly odd phrase to use - makes it sound like they were using the wrong kind of mushrooms. I suspect it was a polite way of saying cock-ups. Either way, the significant point is that a mere Japanese 9-dan spotted things that were not just mistakes but things characteristic of amateurs as a species. They won't like that at the lodge meetings of MoU!

Separately, a remark by the new Honinbo Dowa, Yamashita Keigo, caught my eye. He'd just finished a title match with eight hours each per game. He said that a game with decent time limits is one where you have few regrets. That seemed to imply that he believes that games with short time limits are dominated by mistakes. No surpise there, but I still found it a revealing remark. He also mentioned in passing that amateurs only remember the games they've won. That baffles him as it's the games you've lost that you should remember.

Randomly skipping on, there have been several attempts recently in Japan to improve exposure of Japanese players to Korean and Chinese influence. One example is a series of games by Rui Naiwei against Japanese go's top female pros. She's been pretty dominant but was brought up sharp by Xie Yimin. There was also a provincial city (I've forgotten which) that organised a mini festival featuring three or four Korean pros. One was Yu Ch'ang-hyeok. Top player on the Japanese side was Yamada Kimio, not quite the wave of the future I'd have thought, but still the idea's right.

In that connection, it occurs to me that the underlying strength of the Japanese go scene, namely the newspaper sponsors, is also something of a weakness. They only want to publish the games of their own events, which usually means featuring exclusively Japanese players. The result may be that the ordinary Japanese go player is only dimly aware of what is happening over the water. In addition, many Koreans learn Japanese - it's easy for them - and China can always call on hordes of superb graduates from their foreign language colleges to help with any language. Japan is still somewhat insular. Although many now speak decent English, I don't recall ever meeting one who knows Korean. Quite a few of the older generation can handle classical Chinese brilliantly but in general they are not so hot with modern Chinese. Of course, there are some Japan-based players such as O Meien who speak Chinese through being Taiwanese, but for most of Japan's players what is happening in China must be close to a total blank. There is a series of interviews with Chang Hao and Piao Wenyao in the recent issues of Gekkan Go World but the magazine is having to rely on Ko Reibun (Nie Weiping's son, and so a native Chinese speaker) to interview them.

There. Just a little something to spice up the coffee break. Nothing to take too seriously. Except perhaps the advice to remember your losses (though in my case that would mean far too much work).

That's extremely interesting (as always!). I'll try to think more about remembering my losses

Is there any particular situation where the 'European beats Korean 7d => European could beat Japanese 9d' viewpoint has been expressed, or do you consider it more of a general feeling? That isn't something I've ever heard before.

Interesting as always. A question and a remark:
I'd always thought professionals in training didn't compete in amateur tournaments. Now that I ask, I'm wondering if my only source for that belief is Hikaru No Go...


So clearly the solution must be better English language coverage of the international go scene.

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Occupy Babel!

I felt that this part was his opinion/feeling of how others felt.

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be immersed

I saw a review recently for a certain journal about a professional player's book. It described him as an amateur and not as strong as professional players. This was corrected before it went to publication.

I guess you can't control how people think. Opinions of the relative strengths of strong players are always based on, well, opinion.

The clearest data point you can have are game records, but these don't imply relative strength either.

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be immersed

The "Korean 7d > Japanese 9p" idea may exist in Europe, but I do not think that is a common perception in the US (though Andy Liu has had some success against older 9p players). I suspect that the Korean 7d who show up to play in Europe are not the leading insei, just as the European soccer players who show up to play in the US are not at the top of the game. Korean insei have maintained a reputation for frightening strength for some time, and their notable wins in international tournaments perpetuate this reputation, defeating top pros such as Lee Changho and Yu Bin. I believe that in at least one recent tournament preliminary, Korean insei as a group outperformed the Japanese professional delegation (I remember reading articles comparing their relative performances). I suspect that the Chinese equivalents of these Korean hotshots could put up similar performances, were they given the opportunity.

Personally, I think the Japanese Go world should arrange their tournament schedules to allow good prospects to play in Chinese and Korean leagues. It kills me that Iyama Yuta is not playing in the Chinese league. Inviting Rui Naiwei to play in Japan is also a step in the right direction.

Selected performances of Korean non-professionals from the most recent terms of the LG Cup, Samsung Cup, and BC Card Cup:

15th LG Cup (2009):
Kang Seungmin defeated Ryu Shikun 9p and Kim Donghee 2p.
Min Sangyoun defeated Kim Omin 5p, Kim Youngsan 8p, and Chinese prodigy Yang Dingxin 1p.
Kim Namhoon defeated Kim Younghwan 9p and Tan Xiao 5p.

15th Samsung Cup (2010):
Ming Sangyoun defeated Yoo Jaeho 3p, Mok Jinseok 9p, and Zhong Wenjing 5p.

2nd BC Card Cup (2010)
Park Junsuk defeated Kang Yootaek 3p and Whang Wonjun 9p.
Choi Hyunjae defeated Choi Kyubyeong 9p, Kanazawa Hideo 7p, and Ko Geuntae 7p.
Park Yeongyong defeated Lee Sanghoon 9p, Lee Hyeongro 4p, and Seo Moosang 7p.
Lee Juhyung defeated Oya Koichi 9p, Kim Won 7p, and Seo Gunwoo 7p.
Han Taehee defeated Choi Changwon 6p, Yoo Jaeho 3p, Tsuruyama Atsushi 6p, and Lee Changho 9p.
Lee Sanghun defeated Park Jieun 9p.
Na Hyun defeated Lee Younggu 8p and Yu Bin 9p.

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I am Tartuffe from GoDiscussions.com

One does have to be careful in talking about Korean amateurs in that many of the amateurs who play well in the open tournaments become professional. I know that's not true of Han Taehee, but it's true of one other recent giant-killer (can't think of who it is). One also has to note that the amateurs face a difficult qualifer to make it into the prelims of these open tournaments.

Obviously, this bears on the strength of the very top korean yeonguseng, as well as the strength of a korean 1p, but it doesn't say so much about those players who end up in Europe, unless we know how they fared while in Korea.

I, for one, don't actually know the size of the top class or how homogenous the players are in terms of strength.

There are also patterns in which Japanese players compete in the preliminaries. It strikes me that they tend to be either professionals I haven't heard of, or young promising players, but not those at the top of the game in Japan. If everything were ideal, we'd have Japanese professional ratings, and we could put some numbers behind that impression, but we don't.

That last point bears not on the question "are Korean and Chinese pros stronger than Japanese" or even "are the top Korean amateurs as strong as some Japanese pros", both of which I answer "yes", but the more subtle qualitative questions of "how much stronger?" and "which pros?"

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Occupy Babel!

I too would like to see Iyama hone his skill in the China Weiqi League, but I don't think it's entirely a matter of scheduling. I suspect it's more saving himself for the big-money domestic events. (I don't think any non-Hanguk Kiweon players are allowed in the Korean Baduk League and I think suggesting it there might cause a riot).

The results of Korean amateurs and insei are indeed impressive (and I likewise would not be surprised to see Chinese anateurs do as well) but I observe these facts:

1. Their victories nearly all occur in games with short time limits.

2. All of the successful amateurs are cut down pretty quickly - tall poppy syndrome.

3. Many of the successful youngsters in Korea and China seem to suffer burnout (or it may be that they are being overtaken by new waves of even younger players).

4. Those who get to play pros in slower games seem to find it harder to be successful against established pros. I'm thinking of events like the Pro-Am match after the Wanbao Cup where the very top Chinese amateurs from that play pros on usually two stones. I think the pros still have a definite edge. I'm also thinking of people like Hong Malk-eun Saem who in his day (he's still under 30) was a WAGC star and a Korean insei. He eventually moved to Japan and found it hard to reach the qualifying standard to be a pro there. He eventually made it in the (?inferior) Kansai Ki-in and he doesn't seem to have lit the scene up. In fact even inseis like Na Hyeon above who have recently become pros seem to have gone quiet even in the quickplays.

In short, time appears to be a crucial factor in three senses. One is the length of the time limits. Another is in length of career. Japanese pros seem to be built for the long haul. Korean and Chinese pros seem to have to run a strong risk of being nine-day wonders. And thirdly, one swallow doesn't make a summer.

PS A few Japanese players already have appeared in the China Weiqi League (not recently as the invitations have dried up a bit). I have never collated the results but I can recall Rin Kaiho, Kono Rin, Mannami Kana, So Yokoku and Seto Taiki. I also believe they have a plus score. Kono Rin beat Nie Weiping in his first outing. On the other hand, recent Japan-China youth matches produce pretty frightening scores for the Japanese. I think they lost 6-18 in the latest one (or you could choose to be astounded that they won six ).

While talk about "quickplays" makes me chuckle (or roll my eyes?), I think that a large factor is the popularity of go in Japan. I think go used to be more popular in Japan, and since not as many play, it's natural that you don't have as many Japanese "quick play" champs.

It is a little silly to think that a difference in go skill comes from nationality.

What matters is that there is great interest and effort put toward the game, and nothing more.

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be immersed

I had some talks abut such matters with Korean pros; it seems that apperently Japanese pros are very insular, and also don,t study together. It seems that the standards for insei are quite a bit lower, as many "weak" europeans are let in. This very well might be based on their inherent potential perhaps. In Korea the weakest of the Insei are about 8d kgs...

I was very surprised when I heard that Korean insei don,t study Japanese games, according to the pro I spoke to there is little use in studying games that are not of the highest level. I am paraphrasing, and I do not say i agree or disagree.

I am not strong enough to judge proffesional play, and I cannot know for sure, but my feeling is that if the Korean pros can read very deeply quickly, whos to say they wouldnt play even better with longer time limits. Anyway its all speculation till they try to compete with long time limits---

PS

Weak europeans are not really weak i just mean not 7d level

I have always been under the impression that the title of insei referred more to the type of study program a person was on, and that both countries had insei down into the kyu range. I could be wrong, or perhaps you're referring to only the top tier of student groups in each country?

In Japan an insei is someone who has been accepted as a professional student by the Nihon Ki-in or the Kansai Ki-in. In some professional training programs students used to have ranks expressed as "kyu". For example students at the Kitani Dojo used to have kyu ranks. Kato Masao describes it in one of his books. Students at the dojo had kyu ranks. When a student reached 7-kyu he was sent to the Nihon Ki-in pro qualification tournament. When Kato was accepted as a pro student at the Kitani dojo he was 9-kyu at the dojo but around amateur 5-dan. This was before the amateur rank inflation of recent times. So "kyu" for inseis or professional students isn't the same thing as "kyu" for amateurs.

One western ex-insei said that there were Japanese insei who were just 1-2 dan (EGF). So long as they were young enough/new enough to the game/promising enough, actual strength is not so important.

I believe Bi Jang said he was ~4dan KGS when he became a yeonguseng in Korea. Unfortunately, I don't know how representative that is.

The interesting question is not about the lowest strength of insei, but the strength and size of the top cadre.

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Occupy Babel!

Tsuneishi Takashi is obviously a very strong amateur who failed to qualify for pro status last year by a small margin. And as Amateur Meijin he later played a game against the Pro Meijin Iyama Yuta at reverse komi (afair) and won. I guess it was a rather long time limit as well.

I would like to hear more about all these small events (young pro tournaments, invitationals etc.) which otherwise don't get any english language coverage.

About "weak Europeans" in the Insei league: The interesting thing is that the young european 2-4 dans in the league never made it past the E and D classes.