European Go Congress 2019 ?

[Uberdude]

Re cost, EGC is about half the price of US Go Congress and twice as long!

[jlt]

If you booked really far in advance, Brussels was not very expensive. In general, if you avoided the tourist traps, I think everything was fine there.

Unfortunately not everyone is able to plan a long time in advance. I only booked 2 weeks before, using a link provided by the EGC website. I paid 80€/night for two nights in a hotel room with two twin beds (since I was there just for the weekend). The hotel wasn't so good, since the air conditioner was very noisy and inefficient, so we opened the window instead but the avenue was very busy all night long.

My accomodation choice was certainly not optimal, but I can understand that some people might have been deterred by the cost, especially those who live in eastern european countries.

Otherwise I think the organization of the weekend tournament was good. Rounds started approximately on time, in any case less than half an hour late, and as other people mentioned, receiving pairings by email was convenient.

[HermanHiddema]

5) French ranks are more unpredictable than ever.

Yann Flambard 1d FR played 9 1/2 : 1/2 (default tie in round 2, why?)
in the main tournament, ending at place 9 of the European Open
Championship amidst the 6d and 7d players but with a SOS of 2d - 4d
players. He beat three 4d, two 5d (each 4:1 from CN, of which one beat
me by 1.5 points in round 10) and one 6d (Lukas Krämer) players and
tied against a 4d. So his appropriate rank is at least 5d, IMO.

He didn't play against Lukas. This is the list of his opponents:

Wei Minyue, 1D
Huang Haisen, 4D
Finn Jensen, 1D
Joachim Beggerow, 3D
Philippe Cance, 1D
Yin Zihang, 5D
Herman Hiddema, 4D
Klaus Petri, 4D
Bo Luan, 5D
Andreas Goetzfried, 4D

My game against Yann, in case anyone is interested:



I felt this player was around my level. Both players have their good and bad moments in this game, and both were in the lead at some point.

Seems to me his pairing was a bit weird because of the half point due to the tie in round 2. From round 6, he's very likely to meet players who only entered in the second week, because they also have half a point (both Chinese 5d he met were new entrants in the second week), and if there is no such player at his level, then if the group above him is even he'll get paired down to the group below and meet the player with the lowest SOS there (who is probably the weakest player there). E.g. after round 9, he's 13th, so there are 12 players with more points. Because of that he got paired down against player 27 in the standings at that point.

In the end, perhaps he had relatively weak opponents for someone who got 9th place, but it is still a very impressive result for him.

[Uberdude]

Herman, did you chat to Yann, do you know if he recently studied in Asia or something to get stronger?

[HermanHiddema]

@Uberdude: No, I didn't really talk to him besides the usual pleasantries before the game and a short discussion about afterwards

[Kirby]

Thank you for sharing your game, Herman. My favorite move is T13 at . I like it because it surprised me at first, and I suppose the intention is for connecting, as what happened in the game.

If black were to S12 after T13 to try to prevent a connection, is it a bad move? White could ignore S12, too, with R15 I suppose, since capturing those two stones doesn't give an eye. Or maybe the connection is not a big deal.

Anyway, that part of the game is interesting to me.

[HermanHiddema]

Thank you for sharing your game, Herman. My favorite move is T13 at . I like it because it surprised me at first, and I suppose the intention is for connecting, as what happened in the game.

If black were to S12 after T13 to try to prevent a connection, is it a bad move? White could ignore S12, too, with R15 I suppose, since capturing those two stones doesn't give an eye. Or maybe the connection is not a big deal.

Anyway, that part of the game is interesting to me.

was a mistake, and should have been at S12. In the game, black gets P15 in sente a few moves later and then white needs to capture at S17 anyway, so it is better to play S12, R15, Q15, Q14, S17. White doesn't connect under then, but black gets one less forcing move and white no longer has a weakness at S12 later, so overall black's group remains weaker. The few points lost due to not connecting under are easily less valuable than that weakness.

Black could have played S12, S11, T14, T12, R15 to prevent the connection under, but that would have been an excellent result for white, as the capture makes white even stronger.

[Kirby]

Thanks - I thought connecting under was valuable, but I suppose it's no big deal considering the balance of strength between groups.

Go is hard to evaluate

[Uberdude]

Like Herman says black s12 is a bad tesuji to prevent connection because it makes white stronger and white shouldn't be trying to connect anyway so there's no point stopping it. Black p15 sente of game was aji keshi and is better to not play as it loses s18 choice which removes all white points and eyes in corner so with s11 peep too white becomes eyeless and attackable. Better to let Black cut in gote and live in corner independently with good endgame.

Also white shouldn't exchange q15 q14 because (although it makes false eye) it means white p12 is no longer sente for q14 escape (atari incoming) and that makes a big difference to black being able to break through at o11.

Backing up White's cap seems a bit much given the weak shape to the side.

[Hades12]

How old is Yann? Such rapid improvement could stem from a younger player, who is going to grow naturally at a much faster rate, combined with a lot of study.

[Kirby]

@Uberdude: No, I didn't really talk to him besides the usual pleasantries before the game and a short discussion about afterwards

Now that we're discussing the game, I'm curious about the discussion you guys had on

[gennan]

Maybe Yann is an internet player who doesn't play many RL tournament, so his official rank lags his actual strength?

I played against a Belgian 1k (Nicola Flagothier). After the game he told me he is 5d on Tygem, but doesn't play many RL tournaments. He got 8:2 in the main tournament and I felt like I was playing someone of my level (3d, rating 2305 before EGC). We talked a bit about Yann and Nicola told me Yann is 6d on KGS.

[jlt]

Here is his FFG page:
http://ffg.jeudego.org/php/affichePersonne.php?id=11653

[HermanHiddema]

@Uberdude: No, I didn't really talk to him besides the usual pleasantries before the game and a short discussion about afterwards

Now that we're discussing the game, I'm curious about the discussion you guys had on

Oh, nothing in depth. He just said he hadn't anticipated that move at all, and was therefore unpleasantly surprised by it.

[HermanHiddema]

I also have some questions about the game.

56: why not block at r14?

70 saves two stones, but Black is already alive; was it bigger to take sente to play on the left side?

91: similarly, Black is already alive on both sides, so the o9 and p9 stones are not cutting stones. Was it better for Black to take sente to play on the left side?

=> Seems I have a notation order error. The was already played before . I should have just blocked anyway. I was trying to prevent black from getting a clamp in sente later, but I missed the placement

and => Yes, both players are far too focussed on the right at this point in the game, and both should have played the left much earlier. In the end I'm lucky I went there first.