Yamashita Keigo, newly promoted to 7-dan, gave himself another early birthday present on 30 August 2000 when he overcame Kobayashi Koichi 9-dan in the deciding Game 5 of the 25th Gosei title match. Yamashita will be only 22 on 6 September, and has won his first major title after just seven years as a pro.
He is a product of the Ryokusei Academy featured elsewhere on this site.
Veteran Kobayashi Koichi 9-dan pulled back to level the score at 2-2 in the 25th Gosei title match on 23 August 2000. It has now been decided that the decider in the best-of-five will take place on 30 August at the Nihon Ki-in in Tokyo, with challenger Yamashita Keigo 7-dan (promoted last week) still seeking his first major title.
Game 4 took place in Ishikawa City's Bunka Kaikan Forte, i.e. culture centre. The local newspaper hosting the event, the Hokkoku Shinbun, claims to run the biggest culture centre on the Japan Sea side of the country, and it is a strange fact that go has always featured strongly in that area, which is otherwise a little off the beaten track. Local coverage was strong, with even radio chipping in.
Yamashita continued to give value for money with another of his trademark unusual openings. This one looked new even by his standards. Here is Game 4 in downloadable sgf format.
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Older News From 29 July 2000: A HARD ACT TO FOLLOW
After the huge publicity associated with Game 2 - the local paper used it to trail their 50th anniversary - Game 3 of the 25th Gosei in Sendai on 23 July 2000 fell a bit flat. The local Kahoku Shinpo newspaper maybe thought the recent World Amateur was enough go excitement for one year.
The players at least tried to provide some excitement with yet another novel opening, but instead of the expected speed versus thickness contest expected from Yamashita Keigo versus holder Kobayashi Koichi, Kobayashi seemed to get more than his fair share of access to the centre and moved comfortably towards a 3.5 point victory. This takes the pressure off him somewhat, with the score now 2-1, but he has to survive Game 4 with Yamashita taking Black.
We have to endure a tantalising wait for that game, in Ishikawa City on 23 August, as the long holiday season kicks in.
Older News From 13 July 2000: HIGH FIVES FROM YAMASHITA
For the first time ever in a major title match, move 1 has now been played on the 5-5 point. Being almost the trademark of challenger Yamashita Keigo 6-dan, this ultramodern opening was always on the cards in the 25th Gosei final, and it came on his first opportunity, taking Black in Game 2 on 13 July 2000.
Holder Kobayashi Koichi 9-dan clearly expected it, too, for the pair fairly rattled off their early moves, playing 42 in the session before lunch. It became a speed versus thickness contest, but Yamashita always seemed more comfortable and he wrapped the game up in just 145 moves to go into a 2-0 lead.
250 lucky fans were able to crowd free of charge into the Hotel Buena Vista in Matsumoto City to hear local boy Kobayashi Satoru 9-dan give a commentary on the game. The local sponsoring newspaper, Shinano Mainichi Shinbun, was celebrating its 50th anniversary by hosting this event and clearly got full value for every yen. Almost as a snook cocked at modern fads such as 5-5 it indulged us with the kind of report your correspondent sadly thought was fast disappearing. Just as every third television programme nowadays seems to feature a celebrity chef, so every third go commentary once seemed to feature food. What the players ate was supposed to be the true guide to how the game was going. Stamina-building pasta for lunch, for example, was an indication that a long, drawn-out game could be expected.
The shortening of playing hours has cut down this type of report drastically, but we have here a living fossil. Both players took lunch in their hotel rooms. Kobayashi had a makinouchi bento (white rice with black sesame seeds with a selection of fish, veg, pickles and sweet beans) whilst the challenger opted for a combination platter of fruit with ice-cold milk. For breakfast Kobayashi had partaken of the first-floor restaurant's viking buffet whereas Yamashita had chosen a Japanese breakfast in more private surroundings. For mid-afternoon snacks at 3 p.m. both players had accepted the fruit platter, but Kobayashi had hot coffee and grapefruit juice whilst Yamashita selected iced coffee. They finished at 6.08 but sadly we are not told what they had for supper. (We are NOT making this up).
Although both referee Ishida Yoshio 9-dan and Kobayashi Satoru both separately pointed out that 5-5 was an innovation in title matches, they did not point out that it has appeared in a tournament final before. In the 30th New Stars final earlier this year it was played against Yamashita by Takao Shinji (who lost). It first appeared in serious play when Kitani Minoru tried it against Go Seigen in New Fuseki days in 1934. He followed up with 5-5 on move 2 and 10-5 on move 3 (and lost). It is still rare but Yamashita is not the sole user. Miyazawa Goro also plays it.
Yamashita is known for the great variety of his fuseki play, with both Black and White, so Kobayashi will have little chance to prepare for their third encounter at the KKR Hotel in Sendai on 23 July.
Older News From 8 July 2000: DREAM START FOR YAMASHITA
It was the first major final for twenty-one year old Yamashita Keigo 6-dan. He was pitted against a player he had supported all his life because they come from the same place - Asahikawa City in Hokkaido. Then, having told 190 fans who turned up for a welcome party on the eve of the 25th Gosei title match that he wanted to live down his nickname of "Come-from-behind Yamashita" and to play well from the start, he demolished 47-year-old Kobayashi Koichi 9-dan by 8.5 points in Game 1 on 8 July 2000. Every dream come true! (And this was on the day about 2 million other dreams came true as that number of kids got their hands on the latest Harry Potter.)
Current Gosei Kobayashi, in his party speech in Kumamoto, at the opposite end of Japan from his birthplace, acknowledged people would see this almost as a father-and-son game, but he hoped he could play as if there was no age gap. Perhaps he was hinting to Yamashita that he was prepared to slug it out toe to toe with the youngster if he dared to try any of his trademark avant-garde moves. As it turned out, Yamashita started off conventionally but a strange corner pattern led to an even stranger opening. As referee Kato Masao 9-dan pointed out in his party piece, the styles of the two players are almost diametrically opposed, and the likelihood is that we will see more curious games as this best-of-five proceeds.
The Gosei does not normally rate as highly as the other major titles in the public interest, because it is a one-day format (four hours each with a one-hour lunch break), but Yamashita may continue to break the mould and make it essential viewing.
Older News From 17 June 2000: YAMASHITA MAKES A FINAL AT LAST
Yamashita Keigo 6-dan beat Kataoka Satoru 9-dan in the Challengers' Final of the 25th Gosei on 1 June 2000 and will now challenge holder Kobayashi Koichi 9-dan.
For Yamashita it was third time lucky, having reached the challenge finals in the recent Tengen and Judan tournaments, only to fall at the last hurdle. Now he appears in his first title final - his dream since boyhood - but he has one of the hardest tasks in Japanese go, facing a revitalised Kobayashi. As Yamashita was celebrating his victory, Kobayashi was celebrating at the official ceremony for his victory in the 38th Judan - which he won with a clean sweep!
Mind you, Yamashita is no stranger to winning either. In the last three years he has won 60, 60 and 55 games, and he went into the Gosei challenge final with a 20-5 record so far this year. He also has some minor titles under his belt: the Shinjin-O and the New Stars, for instance.
It appears that Kobayashi and Yamashita have played just once before, in a television game, and Yamashita had the nerve to start with tengen and 5-5. As his recent victory in the New Stars shows, he is still willing to play such avant-garde moves, so we could be in for a spectacular final.
The schedule for the title match is:
Game 1: 8 July (Kumamoto Hotel Castle, Kumamoto City)
Game 2: 13 July (Hotel Buena Vista, Matsumoto City)
Game 3: 23 July (KKR Hotel Sendai, Sendai Cty)
Game 4: 23 August (Bunka Kaikan Forte, Ishikawa City)
Game 5: To be decided (Yugen Room, Nihon Ki-in)
The explanation of the long gap between Games 3 and 4 is that it is holiday season, the Bon Festival in particular, spanning July and August.
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Older News From 14th May 2000: LAST TWO CHALLENGERS SQUARE UP
The Challengers' Final of the 25th Gosei will be between Yamashita Keigo 6-dan and Kataoka Satoru 9-dan. The winner will challenge Kobayashi Koichi 9-dan.
Although Yamashita seems stuck at his low grade, he has recently challenged for then Tengen and Judan, and could make it a trion soon.
In the quarter-finals Yamashita beat Cho Chikun, Kataoka beat Sonoda, Kobayashi Satoru beat Yoda and Hikosaka beat Takao. In the semis, Kataoka disposed of Kobayashi on 14 April, while Yamashita's victim was Hikosaka on 27 April. Yamashita was aided by a slack move from Hikosaka, who started berating himself for being a fool, unprofessional and other unmentionable things. He lost the will to fight after that, claiming the move was so slack it was equivalent to a pass.
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Older News From 12th February 2000: GOSEI DOWN TO LAST EIGHT
The 25th Gosei Tournament has reached the quarter-final of the challengers' stage, with Hikosaka Naoto 9-dan taking the last place when he beat Su Yokoku 6-dan on 27 January 2000.
The Gosei tournament is sponsored by the Newspaper Go Consortium, membership of which has
varied over the years. The current members are the 12 newspapers Kahoku Shinpo (Sendai),
Niigata Nippo (Niigata), Shinano Mainichi Shinbun (Nagano), Shizuoka Shinbun (Shizuoka),
Hokkoku Shinbun (Kanazawa), Kyoto Shinbun (Kyoto), Chugoku Shinbun (Hiroshima), Shikoku
Shinbun (Takamatsu), Kochi Shinbun (Kochi), Kumamoto Nichinichi Shinbun (Kumamoto),
Minami-Nippon Shinbun (Kagoshima), Okinawa Times (Naha).
Although it is still classed as a major, it is slipping badly behind other tournaments as
regards prize money. Top prize is 6.4 million yen.
The Gosei is the successor to, in turn, the Nihon Ki-in Highest Dan Tournament, the Nihon
Ki-in First Place Tournament and the All-Japan First Place Tournament. The change to the
Gosei was made in 1975 to keep pace with the creation of the new Tengen and Kisei titles.
The title holder is challenged by a challenger who is the winner of a year-long
qualification system. Although this has changed, it has always reflected the fact that the
precursor tournaments were intended for high-dan players, and so entry is limited
to players of 5-dan and above, from either the Nihon Ki-in or the Kansai Ki-in.
Originally there was a 5-man league, the places of which were filled by the winners of
five parallel knockouts, which in turn followed a preliminary. Nowadays the final stage is
a knockout of 28 players in Round 1, and the 14 winners are joined by two seeds - the
loser of the title match and the loser of the previous year's challengers final. The
players in third and fourth place in the previous challenger's section, plus two players
invited by the sponsors, are also seeded into Round 1 of the final stage. All other
places are filled by those successful in the preliminaries.
Thinking time is now 4 hours each. It was originally 5 hours, and at the
time this was the shortest time limit of the open tournaments. Komi has
always been 5.5 points.
The word Gosei means Go Sage, the same as Kisei, but is an invented
Japanese term (the Japanese character for go is not normally used in China).
The first event in this series was the Nihon Ki-in Highest Dan Tournament, which began as
a three-game final, but switched to one game in term 2. Komi was 4.5 points. This event
introduced the notion of only 5 hours thinking time each, so that games could be finished
in one day.
This was replaced after four terms by the Nihon Ki-in First Place Tournament when it
reverted to a three-game final (komi still 4.5 points) at the end of a knockout.
This became, with the inclusion of the Kansai Ki-in, the All-Japan First Place Tournament.
The final was still a best-of -three (and 4.5 komi) but in term 3 it switched from being a
straight fight down to the title match (the final stage was a 32-player knockout) to a
system of finding a challenger to play the title holder.
The sponsors in all these events was a newspaper consortium.
Click here to see the list of past winners and challengers for the Gosei.
