So I haven't been active much on here in this forum for a while and I also had a couple of hiatuses where I didn't play much go for some weeks due to other activities. But still there was at least some progress since I began playing Go roughly four years ago.
I'm now at around 6k EGF and yesterday I had the opportunity to play a dan-strength player even in a league match in Germany. I'm writing dan-strength because my opponent was officially listed as 1k for this match but tournament scores from not so far in the past have her listed as 1d. Maybe university studies have been taking their toll.
Still, as this would normally be a 5-stone game, I was curious about how long I would be able to put up resistance and whether I would be satisfied with my play in the aftermath. I'd had games against stronger opponents in the league before and with 5 rank differences it was usually a massacre right out of the opening.
So I went into the game with the goals of using my time well and not immediately get run over in the opening. It seems that I succeeded in this. In the middlegame, around move 70, however, I simply lost a thread after having misread and everything else was just agonizing. Still my resume is that I have lost worst games and at least made my opponent put in some work for me to fall over...
I would appreciate some comments on the part of the game where the game was still interesting. From my point of view, there are a couple of interesting points I'm intereted in:
Bad push, and I didn't have a good feeling about this. During the game I felt that this gives my corner group a bit off extra security in sente as I couldn't quite read out how open the corner on the bottom.
I had no real idea of what is the proper direction to extend from my 4-4 stone. Part of me said the text move is playing too close to thickness. The other part said if extend upwards to something like C10, I induce Black to fix his shape of his upper left group. Or had I already manoeuvered myself into a sitution where that is simply miai for the opponent?
Competing for the left side. Things begin to feel a little tricky for White. Katago agrees and thinks Black is ahead.
I thought that I could get away with this because I could still keep some territory with my top group and at the same time mess up Black's corner. I actually made this decision because I thought that my top group there is some aji on the top left that I could use to handle a Black invasion of the top.
I was kind of banking on this.
Seems too greedy with hindsight. I saw that 3-3 was ok but I wanted to take away more of Black's side and keep the threat of monkey jump later after stretching.
Going with my plan, but not in the correct manner. I initially wanted to play C15, as does Katago. I planned on C15 if Black invaded when I entered the top-right corner. Still I didn't play it. Why? I guess I thought why not force an eye with the text move - totally neglecting how much territory Black gains through these exchanges.So here was the point where it all went downhill. Just a bit later, Black overcame the thin upper border of my small moyo and then I could have resigned. Instead I played on until there was not chance of a comeback anymore, i.e. by cutting off and killing something invading successfully. It was a team match after all
In the end, it's been a bit like in a teaching game. Still, as it was the first time, I thought I'd put a little review request up here.