Sensei's Gazette
Welcome to the Sensei's Gazette. I am an amateur dan player who loves keeping up with the exciting world of professional go. The goal of this page is to allow me to talk about my favourite professional players, and share any interesting anecdotes from the world of professional go with Sensei's Library.
Unofficial World Ranking of Professional Players
In light of the absence of an official world ranking, I have come up with a unofficial ranking of professionals by scoring their performance in various international world championships. Tournaments included are: Samsung Cup, LG Cup, Ing Cup, Chunlan Cup, Toyota Denso Cup, and the Fujitsu Cup, and to a lesser extent, the Asian TV Cup and the Zhonghuan Cup.
Note that these rankings are unofficial, but it is interesting to identify the movers and shakers in the world of professional go today. There has been a lot of debate as to who the best active player currently is, so I decided to come to a conclusion by using a more rigorous method then just plain conjecture. Compiling the results in three year brackets (ie. the ranking for a particular year takes into account the performance of an individual in world championship tournaments in the previous three years), the recent rankings are as follows:
2005 (results from 2003-2005)
- Lee Changho (Winner: 1st Toyota Denso, 4th Chunlan, 8th LG, 5th Chunlan)
- Lee Sedol (Winner:7th LG, 16th Fujitsu, 9th Samsung, 18th Fujitsu, 2nd Toyota Denso)
- Chang Hao (Winner:5th Ing)
- Park Younghun (Winner: 1st Zhonghuan, 17th Fujitsu)
- Choi Cheolhan (Winner: 2nd Zhonghuan)
- Cho U (Winner: 9th LG, 17th Asia TV)
- Song Taekon
- Zhou Heyang (Winner: 15th Asia TV)
- Yu Bin (Winner: 16th Asia TV)
- Yoo Changhyuk
- Cho Hunhyun (Winner: 7th Samsung)
- Cho Chikun (Winner: 8th Samsung)
- Wang Lei
- Yoda Norimoto
- Cho Hansung
- Hane Naoki
- O Rissei
- Gu Li
- O Meien
- Kong Jie
2006 (results from 2004-2006)
- Lee Sedol (Winner: 9th Samsung, 18th Fujitsu, 2nd Toyota Denso)
- Lee Changho (Winner: 8th LG, 5th Chunlan)
- Choi Cheolhan (Winner: 2nd Zhonghuan)
- Park Younghun (Winner: 1st Zhonghuan, 17th Fujitsu)
- Cho U (Winner: 9th LG,17th Asia TV)
- Chang Hao (Winner: 5th Ing)
- Zhou Heyang
- Gu Li (Winner: 10th LG)
- Song Taekon
- Yu Bin (Winner: 16th Asia TV)
- Yoo Changhyuk
- Cho Chikun (Winner: 8th Samsung)
- Park Jungsang (Winner: 19th Fujitsu)
- Wang Xi (Winner: 18th Asia TV)
- Luo Xihe (Winner: 10th Samsung)
- Yoda Norimoto
- Cho Hansung
- Kong Jie
- Hu Yaoyu
- Hane Naoki
2007 (results from 2005-2007)
- Lee Sedol (Winner: 3rd Toyota Denso, 9th Samsung, 18th Fujitsu, 2nd Toyota Denso)
- Lee Changho (Winner: 5th Chunlan)
- Chang Hao (Winner: 11th Samsung, 5th Ing)
- Gu Li (Winner: 10th LG, 6th Chunlan)
- Choi Cheolhan (Winner: 2nd Zhonghuan)
- Cho U (Winner: 9th LG,17th Asia TV)
- Zhou Heyang
- Zhou Junxun (Winner: 11th LG)
- Park Jungsang (Winner: 19th Fujitsu)
- Wang Xi (Winner: 18th Asia TV)
- Luo Xihe (Winner: 10th Samsung)
- Yu Bin
- Hu Yaoyu
- Yoo Changhyuk
- Peng Quan
- Song Taekon
- Cho Hansung
- Kong Jie
- Park Younghun
- Chen Yaoye
Yamashita Keigo 9p
In the last few years, there has been a lot of attention on the playing style of Yamashita Keigo 9p. His unique playing style has garnered him many fans in Japan and around the world. His somewhat unorthodox use of gonogo, tengen and mokuhazushi have captured the imagination of many amateurs. He seems to favor the chinese fuseki and jabberwocks, and often manages to use his moyo to attack the board effectively. In recent years, he seems to have moved away from the center-oriented plays, but he is still achieving a high rate of success in the Japanese pro scene. As of 2006, he still holds the Kisei title, the most important title in Japan.
The most well-known game was probably the one he played with Takao Shinji in the Shin'ei finals in 2000. The game was made even more famous by references in HnG (refer to strangeproopening3). I have collected some Yamashita Keigo games that I have found to be exciting in one way or another, and have listed them here. They are good study material, so interested parties should look the games up.
- Oza-sen Finals Game 3 2006-11-30 Yamashita Keigo (B) vs Cho U B+R
- Tengen-sen Finals Game 3 2006-11-20 Kono Rin (B) vs Yamashita Keigo B+R
- Oza-sen Finals Game 2 2006-11-16 Cho U (B) vs Yamashita Keigo W+1.5
- Meijin-sen League Match 2006-07-06 Yamashita Keigo (B) vs Imamura Toshiya B+R
- Fujitsu Cup Round 1 2006-04-08 Cho Hanseung (B) vs Yamashita Keigo W+R
- Kisei-sen Finals Game 3 2006-02-08 Yamashita Keigo (B) vs Hane Naoki B+1.5
- Tengen-sen Finals Game 3 2004-11-26 Hane Naoki (B) vs Yamashita Keigo W+R
- Oza-sen Challenger Finals 2004-08-30 Yoda Norimoto (B) vs Yamashita Keigo W+R
- Ing Cup Round 2004-04-20 Gu Li (B) vs Yamashita Keigo W+1.0
- Toyota-Denso World Oza Round 1 2002-03-19 Park Younghoon (B) vs Yamashita Keigo W+R
- Gosei-sen Finals Game 2 2001-07-19 Yamashita Keigo (B) vs Kobayashi Koichi B+17.5
- Gosei-sen Finals Game 2 2000-07-13 Yamashita Keigo (B) vs Kobayashi Koichi B+R
- Gosei-sen Finals Game 4 2000-08-23 Yamashita Keigo (B) vs Kobayashi Koichi W+1.5
- Gosei-sen Preliminary Tournament 2000-06-01 Yamashita Keigo (B) vs Kataoka Satoshi B+R
- Shinei Finals 2000-03-19 Takao Shinji (B) vs Yamashita Keigo W+R
- Tengen-sen Prelims 2000-01-27 Yamashita Keigo (B) vs Otake Hideo B+R
- Shinjin-O Finals Game 2 1999-10-04 Hane Naoki (B) vs Yamashita Keigo W+R
- Shinjin-O Semifinals 1999-07-26 Kim Sujun (B) vs Yamashita Keigo W+R
Gan Siyang 3p
For those interested in unique opening styles, you can check out the games of Gan Siyang 3p, who can often be found playing on TOM weiqi server. In recent years, he has used 6-4 (ootakamokuhazushi) almost exclusively, and his unique style has also garnered him many fans and supporters. In the 2005 Chinese City B League, he played 6-4 in every game, and he estimates that he opens with 2 6-4 points in about 60% of his games.
He hopes that his opening ideas will become mainstream in time to come. Chinese fans have given his openings rather interesting names, a few examples of which are given below. You can also find some of his games at http://www.go4go.net/v2/modules/collection/byplayer2.php?pid=487