Today started a new edition of the Nongshim Cup. Japan vs. China vs. Korea, teams if five players, the winner plays again against a new player from the team that didn't play the previous round.

Last year, Iyama won 4 games in a row, and eventually Japan finished second. Not bad, considering the level of each team/country.

This year, the Japanese team is Ichiriki - Iyama - Kyo Kagen - Shibano - Yo Seiki. Having the kisei (top player?) play first, means that you are trying to knock off at least the weakest players of the other teams. It wouldn't look very good if your top players couldn't win even one game.

Well, Ichiriki lost in the first round to Fan Tingyu 9-dan (China). I watched a bit and Ichiriki was never in the game.

And then, I read this in twitter:

https://twitter.com/YennyYoung/status/1579731022333480960

Google translated: Japan is not competitive at all, but Chinese players can't make a living. Ke Jie dixit.

This is no surprise. Japanese players are well payed, specially title holders, and look strong inside their borders. But in international competitions... they stand no chance.

What do you think? Is it changing? Will IA even the level? Do Chinese or Korean players have to work harder because only the very best can make a living?

Ke Jie (if reported correctly) didn't quite say what you said Google said. He said the Nihon Ki-in was training up only inferior players who had a waning sense of competitive awareness. So, is he blaming the Nihon Ki-in (the system)?

As regards China, he said Chinese pros can't live on go alone which (put in that very loose way, which normally refers to competitive go) is also true in Japan and Korea. If Kremlinological speculation is allowed, I'd say that Ke Jie maybe is really having a sly dig at the Chinese go authorities (i.e. their system) who take a very big slice of the earnings Chinese pros make from international events.

It would be somewhat misleading to claim Japan is not competitive in the Nongshim Cup. If you combine the 23rd and 22nd edition then the win percentages are Korea 65%, China 41% and Japan 41%, that is Japan performing pretty well. Before that Japan only won 13% of its games in the 18th to 21st edition, but won 44% of its games in the 17th edition.

It is something akin to if you believed the third best football team was 'uncompetitive'. That would be a bit exaggerated. Basically, they had good runs, they had runs that are equal to the other teams and they also had bad runs. Overall their win rate was 29% in the last 7 editions (China had 62% and Korea 54%).

Looking at overall statistics, are Japanese players with high potential dropping out because they have better income prospects outside of go? Some (many?) Japanese pros can make a living from go if teaching amateurs and operating go salons are included in the calculations. Most Japanese pro level players start training in their teens. I imagine there might be parental pressure for children not to make go their career. Isn't there governmental pressure in China and maybe in Korea to perform well internationally? Wouldn't all these factors affect tournamental performance?

I agree all these points are pertinent (though I might not go so far as to claim government pressure in Korea), but maybe there's a simpler explanation.

Even on this forum, there seems to be significantly more interest in Japan than in Korea or China, and I would be willing to argue that that's because the Japanese pro go scene goes much further and, maybe more importantly, seems more well-rounded, with a bigger tournament scene that includes some events in their 70th year, a known history that goes back several hundred years, nowadays a thriving female presence, two major organisations both of which welcome a hantle of foreign players, and so on.

That's just from our point of view. But I think all these factors also suffuse Japanese go fans and go pros. I would say the Japanese feel about go the way Americans feel about the World Series in baseball. They know it's not an international championship, they know a team from Japan or Cuba of even the Dominican Republic could beat a team of domestic Americans, etc, etc. But they justifiable feel it's "our" game and many fans know the history by heart. And they support it accordingly.

On top of that, although it can only apply to a handful of players, we do know that some Japanese pros have explicitly said they can't afford to concentrate on international competitions, which would mean things like studying the games of players they might never meet from one year to the next (top Chinese players, in contrast, are given coaches who do this research for them).

In recent history Japan has been an huge exporter of their culture. China seems actively opposed and Korea seems to have special regulations that make things difficult.

It's too bad that Chinese Go is in such a poor spot that Ke Jie feels the need to speak out like this. Still, it's nice that Chinese Go fans are paying attention to Japanese Go.

I agree with John's observations. As for reaching out, certainly Japan was most influential in spreading go to Europe and the U.S. Both China and Korea benefited from Japan, jump-starting their professional programs, either accepting Korean players to study and train in Japan or by important Japanese pros making "teaching" tours to China (e.g. Segoe, Shuko, etc.) Some of this happened when there was actual animosity toward Japan in those countries. I recall when about 45 years ago the first visiting team of go players, pro strength, from China visited Japan. Some of the games were reported in Go World and it was fascinating to see how differently the Chinese players played. Some of the Japanese players seemed to be disconcerted by the Chinese players' style. I am not surprised that China has risen to the top. They have a huge population around 11 times the population of Japan. By crude reasoning we could expect to find at least 11 times many very strong players in China than in Japan. And South Korea's population is roughly half that of Japan. When the governmental support in China it is no surprise that they are at the top of the go world. Personally I am appreciative of the work both Korea and China did to reach the level they have within roughly the last 50 years.

What do you think?

Cross out "versus" and embrace the diversity of go.

You asked for it

Ichiriki Ryo isn't number 1 in Japan in any rating system.

Maybe not in any "rating" system, but in "ranking" systems, yes, he is #1.

After my original post, I've read a couple of interesting points that I hadn't considered.

First, the comment of Ke Jie is towards the Nihon Kiin/Kansai Kiin, not the players. In the end, it's the players who play and are strong or not. Obviously. But his words were addressed to the Kiins. It's a subtle difference, perhaps. But maybe it's like saying "my fellow Japanese players aren't competitive because of their system".

Second, the international scene is not equally important for all countries. This was already known, Japanese players make money in domestic tournaments and focus less in international games. There are differences of style, time conditions (important) that can make a difference. Also, John said that Chinese players have coaches who study their rivals and help them play specific games. Japan doesn't have this. Some time ago, it was told here that Ueno Asami had found out that one of her rivals in the international Senko Cup (I don't remember who) usually played this and that fuseki. I was surprised that she didn't "just know". But with players that you rarely play, unless you do specific research, you can't know. On the opposite side, Iyama, Shibano, Ichiriki know each other perfectly.

I'm sorry, but Choi Jung has consistently ranked above Yamashita Keigo in all rating systems for a few years, so basically the players in the three major Japanese leagues can't do much better than the top female player from a country with half their population. It's best not to point fingers at people when they point out notable flaws in your system.

What is lacking are international tournaments designed to work around the schedule of top players in all four countries, with enough prize money, $1,000,000 or so, to make it worthwhile for Japanese players. In addition, no tournaments redraw each round to avoid players from the same country playing each other during integrated preliminaries. This is wrong too.

Essentially, all four countries, Taiwan, Korea, Japan, CCP-China, have serious flaws in their professional systems. Surprise, each of these flaws are fully solved in other countries, to the point of going to the opposite extreme. This tells me that the nationalism of Go Pro associations is killing go. Unlike in Football, Tennis, chess and other sports, the international sports body of Go is inferior to these institutions and is dominated by one country (Japan) and as long as that is the case we will always have Korean tournaments with mickey mouse time limits and sponsorship reigns and weak pros in Japan that just barely do better than the top female pros in other countries and a communist pro scene in china who are pros simply for show as they don't play any games. Okay that sounded way ruder than even what my man Kie Jie said sorry

At least to me, it seems like Japanese, Chinese, and Korean Go are all very much lacking compared to American Go. Lacking pizza I mean. How are they even playing Go without proper motivation and sustenance?

Over here we have the US Go e-journal giving credit where it is due. Not the best players in the world, but the finest Go club in the world. Apparently 18 pizzas were "devoured." Love it.

https://www.usgo.org/news/2022/10/san-d ... ournament/

I scream, and we all scream, ...

I'm sure those pizza's are pretty good, but I can get quality authentic Italian pizza to play go with.
Let's say there's a go tournament every game of go has an associated pizza. The suggested proportion of area you have compared to the opponent determines the proportion of pizza you have after you win. That should motivate Japanese pros!

In a 64 player knockout that's 64 pizzas. But if it's a 6 round swiss that's 224 pizzas. Wow.

Link to vid https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1AW4y1 ... m=autoNext