Yi Se-tol

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Yi Se-tol (이세돌, also spelled Lee Sedol) is a Korean 9-dan professional. He is probably one of the top ten players in the world, perhaps even top five.

Born 2 March 1983. Considered as a player capable of overtaking or surpassing Yi Ch'ang-ho in the not too distant future.

On 3 August 2002 he defeated Yu Ch'ang-hyeok to win his first major international title, the 15th Fujitsu Cup.

On 27 March 2003 he beat Yi Ch'ang-ho 3-1 to win the 7th LG Cup. Taking into account women-only titles as well, this marked Korea's 23rd consecutive victory on the international title scene.

He was promoted from 3-dan to 6-dan in April 2003 and to 7-dan in May 2003 because of his strong title match results. In July 2003 he won his second consecutive Fujitsu Cup title, and was promoted to 9-dan. He progressed from 1-dan to 9-dan in only eight years.


Game archive: [ext] http://leesedol.go4go.net/

Promotion History:


YY: Lee Sedol recently won the Samsung Cup 2004. Since he beat Lee Changho for the LG Cup in the early 2003, this is his first major win, domestic or international, and it is his 4th major international title. What is striking is his control of pace in the final match against Wang Xi 5d of China whose style is similar to that of Lee Changho. Instead of the usual aggressive style of slugging out from the very beginning, he demonstrates patience and balance waiting for a chance to crush the opponent in the mid game -- and he does. The second game was fun to watch. His fans will love his razor sharp attack into the mid game. Also, the semi-final match between Gu Li 7d of China and him is highly entertaining. After winning the first game, they play the second game like blitz (the frist game was played quite quickly, as well), and Gu Li won before lunch break! Then, Lee turns deliberate and methodically defeats Gu Li in the decisive game. Very exciting match robbing me of a few nights of good sleep.

YY: Lee SeDol has been widely considered as a forerunner of the new Korean players who can challenge and even surpass Yi ChangHo. This year (2003), he has proven it by winning two world competitions, LG Cup and Fujitsu Cup. Perhaps more significant than just winning the titles, he defeated Yi ChangHo by 3-1 in the final of LG Cup. Considering that Yi ChangHo has been almost unbeatable in the finals, especially in a 5 game series, many consider it as a beginning of a new era of Korean Badook (Go), the truth of which we will have to wait and see.

Lee is thought to be as talented as Cho HunHyun (known to be the most talented player of at least his generation). Lee is as intuitive. He is as quick and deep in reading. He is as lethal in battles. He is as masterful at creating and handling chaotic warfare.

However, the most interesting aspect of his game lies in his risk loving tendency. Most top ranking Go players would not jump into a showdown battle of uncertainty unless absolutely necessary. In that sense, they are risk averse.

For instance, Yi ChangHo is the very definition of risk aversion. He is a master of defense. He is a master of transforming a chaos into a simple, orderly universe.

Yoo ChangHyuk has been considered as a most offensive minded player. However, his attacks are brought about only when he has a positional superiority (thickness). At the same time, his attacks are not designed to create decisive battles. He sticks to an old saying: "chase enemies leaving an escape route." Desperate enemies without an escape route present do or die struggles, and Yoo does not want the situation. In other words, Yoo's battles, by design, are a way to accumulate advantages, rarely a way to deliver a knock out blow. He is risk averse contrary to a popular belief.

Cho HunHyun has a style of Sugar Ray Leonard. He has dazzling footwork (soft wind -- fast movement both in the opening and in the mid-game development) and penetrating jabs followed by a knock out blow (a quick spear -- a ruthless thrust into the enemy's tinest weakness). As he suffered worst defeats by Yi ChangHo, his own pupil, Cho's style has become even grittier earning a nickname of "God of War" (in order to deliver a fatal thrust in the mid-game and thus minimize the importance of the endgame at which Yi has no peer). Nevertheless, Cho's style still reflects that battles are "resultant of" positional struggles in the opening or in the mid-game. He has also said that he would seek a best move even if he were ahead, and the move added additional uncertainties and therefore risk. He is risk neutral.

Lee SeDol is somewhat similar to Cho in style, which prompted some Korean critics to nickname him as "Little Cho." Lee does have an ability to deliver a quick, brilliant thrust of Cho's. At the same time, Lee and Cho have an uncanny resemblance in the ability to "shake" ("shaking," literally translated from a Korean expression, means waging chaotic all out battles at the end in an attempt to turn the tide of the war).

However, a critical difference between the two is that while Cho is more orthodox and conventional in his view of the mid-game such that battles are a consequence of positional struggles, Lee emphasizes battles such that positional struggles are simply a prelude of a decisive battle and can even be forsaken. It can often be observed that Lee engages in battles shortly after the opening without ensuring positional superiority nor out of necessity to make up for an inferior position. More often than one may suspect, positions are determined by the battles in Lee's games. At the same time, unlike Yoo (or Cho to some extent), Lee's vicious attacks are designed to be decisive instead of to be a way to maintain or shift positional superiority without engaging in do or die showdowns.

In other words, Lee is a risk lover. And that means exciting games for fans.

One interesting tidbit is that Lee's aggressive, risk taking style reflects a stereotype of Korean Go tradition which has been thought to be amateurish and inferior to all encompassing, well rounded, mostly risk averse modern styles (e.g., those of the Korean players mentioned above). Whether or not Lee is talented enough to maintain consistency with the style is to be seen.

Lee's weaknesses have also been exposed. First of all, his judgement of position is not of top notch -- again relatively speaking, that is. Perhaps because of this, he has chosen to live and die with showdown battles. Or, his aggressive disposition/preference and hence the style have prevented him from studying this particular aspect of the game. Whichever is true, it seems that the relative deficiency in perhaps the most important aspect of the game may prove to be his biggest obstacle to win consistently against top rated players.

Secondly, he appears to turn overly pessimistic when things do not go as he planned. Combined with the deficiency discussed above, this once led him to resign in 106 moves, and he was thought to be still ahead in the game even by his opponent. In other words, he can be emotional and displays the lack of objectivity from time to time. This tendency may prove to be another obstacle for him to win consistently.

Lastly, he is not as studious and relies too heavily upon his talent. This will hinder his growth as a Go player and may not help him to accommodate changes necessary to stay afloat in the long run. Yi ChangHo has been able to survive on the top over a decade mainly because his constant study of Go has deepened and broadened his game. Can Lee enjoy such longevity relying on talent alone? Considering that Cho HunHyun, a natural, had to redefine himself (and still is outclassed by Yi ChangHo) in order to survive the onslaught of the 90's in the Korean Go scene, Lee SeDol will have to further his game and possibly reinvent himself in future.

At any rate, there is no doubt in my mind that Lee SeDol is the most exciting player in Korea right now. He is explosive, creative, daring, powerful, and flamboyant. His game is strong enough to even psychologically affect Yi ChangHo. His brilliance is radiant enough to beat Cho HunHyun 8 times in a row. His palettes are diverse enough to have already won 3 world competitions and many fans (some of whom are so conservative that they would normally chide and defy a kid like Lee who lacks modesty and humility in a traditional sense).

I predict that he is going to be exchanging blows with every top rated player in the world for quite a while.

P.S. I recommend [ext] the semi-final match of 16th Fujitsu Cup between Lee and Yoda Norimoto. It is by no means a well played game by either player. Nevertheless, it is luminary of Lee's style and tendencies, good and bad. Shortly after the opening and some rudimentary development of sides, Lee starts complicating a situation. Yoda makes a mistake (or lets a big battle occur while taking material advantages). Lee splits Yoda's group and goes for the neck. Then, facing Yoda's skillful dodges, Lee turns pessimistic and settles for the lesser group of Yoda's (Lee could have ended the game by capturing the bigger group but somehow missed not so difficult capturing moves), which puts Lee into a deep trouble materially. Then, Lee engages in a rather complicated "shaking," and Yoda under time pressure makes a mistake. The game ends in favor of Lee by a half house (point).


Yi is known as one of the most creative players. I put some highlights of his "weird" [ext] blitz game below, which was also shown in the AGA newsletter with the title "Don't play this at home".

[Diagram]

Moves 67 to 74 (B: Yi Se-tol W: Hong Chang-sik)

[Diagram]

Moves 89 to 97 (B+R at 211)

Alex Weldon: Madness. I mean, that's a lot of captures, but wow...

whistler? Sorry, i dont really understand this situation !!!! please help me :D

DJ: Well, Black played a flamboyant manoeuver, chasing White in a ladder that was not expected to work, just to be able to play B7 in sente in order to capture all the marked White stones in the BR corner! And at the cost of seeing many, many of his stones played in the non-working ladder capured in a series of double atari.

JangJirak? Despite the broken ladder, this exchange is a huge loss for W. However W was forced to play this way, which I'll explain below.

Scryer: However, as it turned out Yi continued to present Hong with more urgent situations to solve, until finally Hong resigned without ever getting around to taking ANY of Yi's hanging ladder stones.

[Diagram]

Variation: W had no options (B: Yi Se-tol W: Hong Chang-sik)

w6 at b1

[Diagram]

continuation of above (B: Yi Se-tol W: Hong Chang-sik)

JangJirak? Actually, B1 was the surprise move that forced W to play out the exchange. No matter what W does now, W can't avoid a huge loss. W admitted he didn't notice this move and was shocked to see it; otherwise he would have avoided it before.

Note the timing of B1 in the previous diagram. Lee played out a few moves of the broken ladder before this foreplanned ambush move, giving W no chance to escape his plan.

Lee had read this all out already when he played his first move around the UL corner before this sequence (that is E17), and considering this was a blitz game, it's amazing isn't it?


This is a copy of the living page "Yi Se-tol" at Sensei's Library.
(OC) 2004 the Authors, published under the OpenContent License V1.0.
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