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Joseki
Keima
44LowApproach
SmallKnightExtens...

 

small knight extension from 4-4
  Difficulty: Beginner   Keywords: Joseki

[Diagram]
Diag.: Very common

This is the most common response[1] for Black, when White approaches at 1, if you look at contemporary pro games. Playing 2 on the third line is territorial, and the variations that follow are mostly to do with Black's initial 4-4 point taking territory in the corner. This play has been seen increasingly in the past decade.


[Diagram]
Diag.: Standard

These further plays constitute a standard joseki - perhaps the most common such pattern of all, now.

4-4 point - contact play on the slide discusses 2 at a, which isn't joseki.



Instead of the slide to 1, White can extend back on the side immediately, or play tenuki here. See small knight extension from 4-4, tenuki for detailed analysis. The tenuki play allows Black to attack with the diagonal attachment; evaluations of the severity of the attack seem to have changed in the 1990s, and nowadays White often does play tenuki. It is unusual for White to invade directly at the 3-3 point: since Black's corner is not so large, this doesn't have high priority.

[Diagram]
Diag.: Variation after the slide

The major variation occurs when Black blocks on the upper side, allowing White to play at a. Now Black is changing plan, giving up the corner for outside influence.

See small knight extension from 4-4, slide, pincer for this line. Also 4-4 staircase joseki for a complex variation.


[Diagram]
Diag.: Contact play

There is also Black 1 here, an old idea but really only played often from 1995 onwards. It is an attempt by Black to develop on both sides.



DaveSigaty: I was interested in whether the slide is really the most frequent continuation against the small knight. It is the most frequent according to GoGoD CD, appearing about 40% of the time. Having said that, the most frequent strategy for White after the small knight extension is to tenuki with her next move. This is a little more frequent than the immediate slide. Once White plays tenuki, Black and White are about equally likely to play next in this area. Black has played conservatively with the small knight extension and White's original small knight approach is a resourceful stone so this may not be the most urgent part of the board. A significant portion of the final shapes, including the slide, occur after White or Black come back to this corner.

Charles Matthews Yes, I think the swing in opinion about the diagonal attachment attack (not just my prejudice, since Guo Juan talks about this) has led to a substantial use of 'kakari kikashi' by pros in recent years. That is, White plays the approach in the first diagram in order to get an answer (rather expecting the keima); and then treats this as a kikashi or probe. Anyway, such seems to have been the fashion.

[1] Bill: Shouldn't we call this small knight response instead of extension? Not that it is not an extension, but the point is that it is a response. Extension is ambiguous.

Charles As far as I'm concerned we should have some better and systematic terminology going on, as a parallel system. Current joseki names here are unwieldy and I'm not sure they parse: so that might be the worst of both worlds. I'm happy to go along with other people's ad hoc ideas for the moment. One could argue that the main families of responses are pincers and extensions; so I don't have too much against this title.

Bill: Well, my first thought, looking at the title was this:

[Diagram]
Diag.: Small knight extension


This is a copy of the living page "small knight extension from 4-4" at Sensei's Library.
(OC) 2003 the Authors, published under the OpenContent License V1.0.