April 1993

Otake Hideo has raised his rank to 10 dan, for a year at least, by taking the Judan title from Takemiya Masaki. The final score was 3-1. Surprisingly, this is Otake's first triumph in nearly eight years in a newspaper-sponsored tournament. Back in 1969 the Judan title was the first major title of his career, so his winning it again is auspicious.
One reason for Otake's success in this year's Judan match was that he played faster than his opponent. Takemiya lost both the third and fourth games under time pressure: an oversight cost him sente at a crucial point in the third game; and near the end of the fourth game he committed a subtle but disastrous error in a ko fight. The irony of this is that for years, Takemiya has been complaining that the time allowances are too long.

Japan has placed three of its major title-holders -- Otake Hideo, Cho Chikun, and Kobayashi Koichi -- in the quarter-final round of the Fujitsu Cup. Kato Masao and Awaji Shuzo are also in, giving Japan five of the eight quarter-final spots. One Japanese player who did not make it was Takemiya Masaki -- he lost in round one to the only woman contestant, Yang Hui of China. That got the Chinese off to a good start, but they suffered four reverses in round two, leaving only their current national champion, Xiao Weigang, still in competition. Conspicuous by his absence was teen-aged Lee Changho, who is too busy winning Korean titles to have time for the Fujitsu Cup this year. His place was filled by Yang Jaeho, who upset Rin Kaiho before losing to Shao.

     First round (April 3) 
	Kato Masao (Japan)        beat   Perng Kinghwa (Taipei)
	Yang Jaeho (Korea)        beat   Rin Kaiho (Japan)
	Seo Bongsoo (Korea)       beat   Alexei Lazarev (Europe)
	Yang Hui (China)          beat   Takemiya Masaki (Japan)
	Lin Shengshien (Taipei)   beat   Senfeng Wang (S. America)
	Yoo Changhyeok (Korea)    beat   Ishida Yoshio (Japan)
	Cho Chikun (Japan)        beat   Michael Redmond (N. America)
	Awaji Shuzo (Japan)       beat   Zhang Wendong (China)
     Second round (April 5) 
	Kato Masao (Japan)        beat   Liu Xiaoguang (China)
	Shao Weigang (China)      beat   Yang Jaeho (Korea)
	Kobayashi Koichi (Japan)  beat   Seo Bongsoo (Korea)
	Cho Hunhyun (Korea)       beat   Yang Hui (China)
	Otake Hideo (Japan)       beat   Lin Shengshien (Taipei)
	Yoo Changhyeok (Korea)    beat   O Rissei (Japan)
	Cho Chikun (Japan)        beat   Nie Weiping (China)
	Awaji Shuzo (Japan)       beat   Ma Xiaochun (China)

One of the Korean titles that Lee Changho is gunning for is the Tongyang Securities Cup, which has come down to a five-game final match between Lee and Cho Chikun. The first two games were played in April, and Lee won them both. However, it's hard to say whether this should give Lee's fans cause for joy or worry. In the past, when driven to the brink of defeat, Cho has been aroused to stage some formidable fight-backs. His level of arousal will be tested in the Honinbo title match, which starts May 7, before Tongyang Cup play continues.

Cho Chikun's challenger for the Honinbo title will be Yamashiro Hiroshi. Going into the final round of the Honinbo league tied with Rin Kaiho, Yamashiro won his last game against Ishida Yoshio while Rin Kaiho lost to Kataoka Satoshi. Kobayashi Koichi lost to Komatsu Hideki and finished in last place, after being challenger in 1990-1992. From top to bottom, the league ended this way: 1 Yamashiro (5-2), 2 Komatsu (4-3), 3 Rin and Kataoka (4-3), 5 Otake (3-4), 6 Chin (3-4), 7 Ishida (3-4), 8 Kobayashi (2-5).

How strong are Japan's top amateurs? That was the question posed in a lengthy fifteen-game no-komi match between five of Japan's amateur elite and five young, middle-ranked (4-6 dan) professionals, which ended in April. The two sides started out alternating black and white, with the conditions to be adjusted whenever either side got two games ahead. The amateurs ended up 0-3 playing white and 6-6 playing black, but managed to avoid the indignity of a two-stone handicap. In fact, they would have finished up playing on even terms if three-time world amateur champion Imamura Fumiaki had not closed out the match by losing three straight to Morita Michihiro, a twenty-two-year-old pro 6-dan.