While watching recordings from some of the transatlantic games and other games, the commentators have mentioned a China trip few times. Had I watched live, I could have asked in the stream from them, so instead I'll try asking here. I haven't followed the go scene all around so I have these gaps I want to fill.

Ali Jabarin apparently was in China around the time of the first egf-aga match. Then I understood that Mateusz and probably the other pros occasionally visit China.

What do they do there? I have only understood as much as that they "study", but I would want to know more details. I searched this forum and found posts about Artem playing in chinese C league matches in 2018, so I guess that's related?

I know chinese A league result page at https://gotoeveryone.k2ss.info/cn/al/21 but what about B and C league? I saw in senseis that B league is an annual tournament, I guess C league is similarly. Does euro pros play in some chinese league teams this year?

I know Michael Redmond and Antti Törmänen participate in the japanese pro tournaments like any other japanese pro, so these first questions are more about what the euro pros do in China.

Europe has been sending a Pro team to the Chinese C league with very limited success. They never won a proper game as a team. They only scored a few draws. See this topic from last year: https://lifein19x19.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=15820

The best they achieved so far is avoid the last place. So they are far from being able to participate in the B league. Mateusz Surma did very well 4 years ago (4 wins) while Ilya Shikshin did very well last year (4 wins as well). We'll see if anybody else steps up next month.

I think if they get a win as a team (which requires 2-3 wins in the same round) this year they will consider 2019 trip a success. Wolfking is our source of information for Chinese tournaments each year. I look forward to seeing what happens next month.

silviu covered the Chinese C league, which is an annual event. Here's news articles on them from the pros on eurogofed:
2017: https://www.eurogofed.org/index.html?id=135 (It was 2 not 4 years ago Mateusz got his many wins, see also
forum/viewtopic.php?p=220508#p220508)
2018: https://www.eurogofed.org/?id=223
Though I'd disagree with him about "with very limited success." That's if you measure success by winning the league. That would be a crazy dream. If you measure success by getting serious tournament experience against pros, increasing confidence, growing their skills then I think it's been a success. Mateusz's results in the Transatlantic team match are evidence of that, as is the general strength improvement of the Euro pros.

The Euro pros also go to China for various tournaments, e.g. Silk Road https://www.eurogofed.org/index.html?id=71.

For study there is a CEGO (group of Chinese Go supporters of the EGF pro system) training in a Go school in Beijing. Not sure if the pros just drop in there occasionally, here are some diaries of non-pro top/promising Europeans who study there:
Sinan Djepov: https://explorebaduk.com/book/
Gabriel Wagner: https://www.eurogofed.org/?id=226

Nice info and interesting blog posts!

IMSA World Masters Championship seems to be the reason for Mateusz next China trip.

https://www.intergofed.org/igf-news-fee ... rules.html

Maybe this tournament is a worth an own thread too here on the forum so I won't go (now) into its details but I wonder if yikeweiqi will have broadcasts

You have to put Europe's performance in the proper context. The game is still young in Europe, and for the European pros to have won a few games in the Chinese C-league was by no means a no small feat. Until recently, even the Japanese languished for years in the Chinese C-league.

For how many years?

Don't know how many years, but I do know that it wasn't until approximately two (or three?) years ago that Japan finally qualified for the B-League.

I think the Japanese team started in the B-League in 2012 and was demoted to the C-League that year. They stayed in the CL until 2017 when they finished at the top of CL. In 2018 they were back in the BL. They finished about 7,8th so will play in the BL again this year.

Did the Chinese C league start? On yike I see a broadcast of Ilya Shikshin vs some Chinese woman presumably a pro.

Also regarding Japanese team I searched old threads and like wolfking said they started in B (with a team including veteran Cho Chikun) in 2012 but got demoted, spent 3 years not promoting out of C league in 2013, 2014, 2015, but then won it (Ichiriki Ryo joined team) in 2016 so were in B league from 2017 onwards.

See: http://slide.sports.sina.com.cn/go/slid ... ml/d/1#p=1

I guess you were talking about this one: https://home.yikeweiqi.com/#/live/board/18980

It was a warm-up match for C League between Team Tsinghua Zijing Fund (Team Europe) and Team Tsinghua University, Ilya vs Song Ronghui 5P. Song is a student at Tsinghua Uni, same as Gu Li, Jiang Weijie, Ke Jie etc.

Just a little heads up:

Tomorrow on thursday Antti Törmänen 1p will play against the legendary Yoda Norimoto 9p in Tengen qualifications

The match begins 10am local time (4am finnish time) and is broadcasted live on wbaduk/cyberoro and maybe on yikeweiqi. The match may last up to 6-7 hours.

https://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/match/tengen/046.html
http://njk.nihonkiin.or.jp/UI/01INFO/news.php
http://u-gen.nihonkiin.or.jp/live/schedule_list.asp (games appearing here are broadcasted to online servers)

Intresting. Will Yoda make the same mistake he did when playing against Hans Pietsch in 1997 (English commentary of the game here)?

Antti vs Yoda game can be found here:
https://online-go.com/demo/view/404051

Interestingly there will be another one getting broadcasted quite soon as Michael Redmond 9p vs 24th Honinbo Ishida Yoshio 9p - Meijin A qualifiers gonna be relayed on thursday 25th July in wbaduk.

Winner of this match will face Takao Shinji in a decisive match from where a winner will enter the "final preliminary" stage. So to enter the Meijin League Michael (or Ishida) has to win 4 more games after this one.

https://www.nihonkiin.or.jp/match/meijin/045.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yoshio_Ishida


To have these two games (Antti last week and Michael now) both on broadcast within a week is a bit special treat I think. I have been following the japanese pro scene on and off for the past some years and correct me if I am wrong but I think Michael Redmond's games get relayed some 5 times a year on average, and Antti about once a year.

White Michael Redmond Black Ishida Yoshio

lol except that tomorrow there will be relay of ootake hideo - michael redmond ouza qualifiers on wbdauk, and exactly one week later again michael redmond - kobayashi satoru (gosei qualifiers). Could be that I haven't been just paying attention much earlier..

edit:
ootake match kifu 1.8.2019:
http://eidogo.com/#G3FoXTqM

kobayashi satoru match kifu 8.8.2019:
http://eidogo.com/#3jUp1pKEI

Michael won again!

Today there was Judan C qualification 2nd round match Antti Törmänen - Ooya Kouichi 9p. Ooya (-66) had beaten a 5dan (born -70) in the first round, Antti had a free route to the 2nd round. Ooya won the match. According to Leela the win % went down slowly and steadily.

Following up the 3 weeks ago win from Ishida Yoshio in the Meijin A qualifications Michael Redmond faced on the 2nd round Takao Shinji today. The winner of this match advancing to the "final qualification" before the Meijin league (3 more wins to enter Meijin league).

...AND.. Michael Redmond continues his superb winning streak! This one feels particularly big win, Takao Shinji is #88 in the goratings.org ranking list at this time and 7th highest ranked Nihonkiin player!

I am not a good of an analysis maker, but it felt like Michael continued the strategy from the last week. Last week he engaged in an early game "fight" or severish cut against Kobayashi Satoru and seemed to get a good position from it ( I didn't check LZ)... and this time again, there was an early "severe looking cut" in the Takao Shinji game.