Othello News March 2016
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Tom Schotte wins Ghent Easter TournamentLocation: Ghent, Belgium
Date: March 28th Link: BOA website Tom Schotte won the Ghent Easter Othello tournament 2016 with 6.5/7. The only flaw was a draw against Martin Fransen in round 1. Dimitri Vaes finished second with 6 wins. A nice top 2 for our Belgian friends, with a pack of Dutch players right behind. 
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Piyanat Aunchulee wins Thailand Othello ChampionshipLocation: Bangkok
Date: March 27th Tourney format: 7 rounds Links: LiveOthello, FB photoalbum, Thai Othello Association website Thailand Othello Championship 2016 results: Champion: Piyanat Aunchulee 2nd place: Alex Koh Bo Chao 3rd place: Sittisak Tantiprasongchai Female champion: Nida Pattarakul Female runner-up: Chatcha Ratthanadechathorn Debut champion: Sombat Saelee Youth champion: Sanya Damrianan Congratulations to all!! |
final game 3
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KOH Bo Chao 28-36 AUNCHULEE Piyanat Thailand Championship, final game 1 |
AUNCHULEE Piyanat 25-39 KOH Bo Chao Thailand Championship, final game 2 |
KOH Bo Chao 24-40 AUNCHULEE Piyanat Thailand Championship, final game 3 |
Ladies final: Chatcha - Nida
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RATTHANADECHATHORN Chatcha 9-55 PATTARAKUL Nida Thailand Championship, Ladies final |
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SRICHAMNONG Chirawat 17-47 TANTIPRASONGCHAI Sittisak Thailand Championship. playoff 3/4 |
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Othello Organisation Singapore interviewsFive representatives from Singapore took part in the Thailand Othello Championship 2016. The Othello Organisation Singapore published interviews with these five players before they took off to Thailand.
interview 1, Alex Koh Bo Chao. interview 2, Koh Bo Xiang interview 3, Anthony Goh Jun Jie interview 4, Jacky Gan Chin Leng interview 5, Chua Zi Wei |
Thailand Othello Championship 2016 review
Post by Koh Bo Chao on Facebook
I want to congratulate Vic Thai Rider for organising a great tournament. As usual, I felt that Thailand has an abundance of talented Othello players.
Although I managed to qualify for the finals with a score of 6/7 wins in the swiss pairing preliminary (including a lucky win against Natsuke Aunchulee), the process was hardly easy to say the least.
I had a few games I had to come back from behind to win by lucky against many strong thai players such as my first round opponent and boyzilla. And of course the game I lost to Chirawat was a tough one as well.
Despite the difficult games faced at the tournament, what I truly enjoyed was the camaraderie with my brother Koh Bo Xiang when we were facing off two of the best thai players in the tournament at table 1 and 2 at round 4 right after lunch. Although we both lost that round, we managed to bounce back at round 6 against the same two players (just different opponents) this round and score wins for Singapore.
Of course it was apt for me to meet my brother in the final round where the winner would go on to challenge the undisputed strongest thai player piyanat who was twice a former World Championship 2nd place. I was lucky to come through against my brother narrowly by 34-30.
In what was an expected replay of the 2011 finals between myself and piyanat, I gambled my first game with a pre-planned opening recommended by Kenneth Paw and Yan Song. But somehow i misplayed it and ended up losing in a straightforward fashion 28-36. I was quite affected mentally when piyanat mentioned it was the same opening he had lost to nobukawa in the finals of woc 5 years ago as I hadn't expected he would knew exactly where I (or my advisors) were coming from.
Before the start of game 2, mentally I already felt defeated. I spent the first 2 minutes staring at the board where piyanat played his first move as black thinking what it would take to take down this machine (or robot). At the same time, my peripherals noted that my Singapore team mates had returned from their dinner to support me. Prior to this game, I was joking with the thai players how I almost managed to win a top european (polish) player Dominik Nowak with the parallel opening back in OWC 2013. They probably wasn't taking me too seriously as well when I joked I might play parallel.
I thought since nat was so good at memorizing positions and he seemed willing to have a go at parallel, I placed the disc firmly down on the square for the same opening as if I had a plan.
Nat paused for a while as the other thai onlookers also shot me "are you for real?" looks. Not sure how the Singapore players felt when they saw me play that hand, but I was pretty damn sure they were probably laughing at it as well.
The game went on with the first 10 moves or so within expectation. Somehow in the midgame I just tried to keep up with nat and managed to make the game messy enough. Although there were times I felt physically hungry and I should probably just lose and all of us could go dinner, somehow despite some mistakes, and "oh shit"s, I squeezed a win of 39-25 in time. This made me feel that perhaps there was a chink in his armour somewhere. At the same time I probably wanted to send a message to him that Othello could still be played freely at the opening instead of just hard memory.
Having achieved a higher disc count, I had the choice of colour. To follow lee sedol's determination against alphago to win in both colours (including the harder colour: black), I decided to pick black and take a challenge. But as expected of a true champion, nat's stamina proved too much for me when I tried to overplay a variation that was too negative in the final third game.
Although I lost in the end, I still felt I gained a lot from managing wins over piyanat who seemed almost impossible to win. Most importantly the self belief in my game that perhaps I too could achieve a higher level beyond what I have been stuck at over the past years.
Brian Rose wins US Othello Open
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Location: Los Angeles, United States
Date: 26-27 March Tourney format: 11 rounds + final Final standings, wins + disc counts: Rose, Brian 9.5 420 Seeley, Ben 9 427 Fu, Jacky 9 403 Yiu, Edmund 9 361 Chitra, Yohanes 5.5 317 Ruhmkorff, Ben 5 305 Kierulf, Anders 5 279 Chen, Albert 4 288 Bentolila, Sarah 3 231 Bishop, Rob 3 192 Ross, Stephen 3 172 Rose, Erica 1 61 Note: Stephen Ross only played 7 rounds, then bowed out due to back pain issues. Erica Rose played in 2 of the remaining rounds against the opponents Stephen Ross would have played. This was an 11 round robin. |
US Othello Open
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SEELEY Ben 31-33 ROSE Brian US Othello Open LA, round 11 |
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Brian Rose won in classic fashion- a 33-31 victory in the last round's tournament-deciding game, versus me (Ben Seeley).
I told him the game was repayment for him buying dinner the previous night, but really it was just his excellent endgame that won the game for him :).
Brian Rose is our first American representative to the WOC in Japan.
We had larger turnout than usual in American tournaments, 12 players, and all had some great games.
For a couple of these players, it's the first tournament games they've had in over a decade, I think. Anders Kierulf started things off with a bang with a 33-31 win against me in the first round!
Stephen Ross has formed an LA Othello Club, the Facebook group page to join is here.
Report by Ben Seeley on NAOthelloTourneys Yahoo Group
Easter school tournament in Skuteč, Czech Republic
Dukchul Shin wins 1st Daejeon Othello OpenLocation: Daejeon, South Korea
Date: March 20th 2016 Tourney format: 5 rounds Ranking of the 8 players after round 5: 1: 4. pts [367] SHIN Dukchul (30035) {KOR} [320] SOHR Jaeyoung (30102) {KOR} 3: 3.5 pts [302] SHIN Donghyeon (35131) {KOR} 4: 3. pts [339] SHIN Dongmyung (35130) {KOR} 5: 2.5 pts [325] KIM Seongchan (30036) {KOR} 6: 2. pts [316] HAN Junho (30103) {KOR} 7: 1. pt [267] KIM Sunghyeon (30039) {KOR} 8: 0. pt [244] NAM Sungwoo (30043) {KOR} |
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KIM Seongchan 27- 37 SOHR Jaeyoung 1st Daejeon Othello Open, round 3 |
SHIN Donghyeon 43-21 SHIN Dongmyung 1st Daejeon Othello Open, round 5 |
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World Othello Championship in Mito JapanRegistered players to W.O.C. 2016, so far:
Germany: Matthias Berg, Jörg Gärtner and Stefan Murawski. Taiwan: Chun-yi Chang We will remind you that registration to W.O.C. must be done latest June 30, 2016. Each Federation can send 4 players + one extra Youth player aged no older then 14 during the year of the tournament. See textfile below. For more information contact WOF office. link: WOC facebookpage 
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Fabrício Silva wins IV Coppa de Othello
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Location: São Paulo, Brazil
Date: March 20th Tourney format: 7 rounds Fabrício Silva won the tournament with 7 wins. Runner-up Lucas Cherem scored 6 points. Third place for Moises Correia Jr. 
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SILVA Fabrício 57-7 CORREIA JR Moises IV Copa de Othello |
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Japan - South Korea Othello matchAt the Meijin it was announced that an annual Japan-South Korea Othello match is scheduled to start February 2017.
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Giuseppe Chiarulli wins GPI Udine
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Location: Udine, Italy
Date: March 20th Link: FNGO website Tourney format: 7 rounds Giuseppe Chiarulli won the tournament with 6 wins and a draw. Runner-up was Gianluca Ilacqua. Third place for Furio Honsell. Best, and I think only lady of the tournament, Maria Serena Vecchi finished 4th. 
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Giuseppe Chiarulli
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Leonid Shifman wins Kfar-Saba Open
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Location: Kfar-Saba, Israel
Date: March 19th
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Both father and son Shifman scored 4 points but Leonid won by Brightwell Quotient.
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Location: Nagoya, Japan
Date: March 19 - 20th Link: JOA website Meijin live: JOA info website Results 36th Meijin-sen 2015 can be found here. Request: please send me results, transcripts and pictures :) Round 4 - 6 and the final will be broadcasted via Line Live, channel 1 and channel 2. |
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Female Meijin
Date: March 19th Touney format: 6 rounds and final Hisako Kinoshita qualified for the final with 6 wins. Yukiko Tatsumi finished 2nd after 6 rounds with 5 wins and 1 loss. Hisako Kinoshita won the final game against Yukiko Tatsumi 41-23. Hisako Kinoshita was All Japan Ladies Champion in 2002 and 2004. She was the first World Female Othello Champion in 2005 and was the Female Meijin in 2005. It took her eleven years to win the Female Mejin again. Othello, a lifetime to master, but it also takes perseverance to win back a title! Winner: Hisako Kinoshita 2nd: Yukiko Tatsumi 3rd: Tae Tomidocoro 
Yukiko Tatsumi (2nd), Hisako Kinoshita (winner), Tae Tomidocoro (3rd)
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KINOSHITA Hisako 41-23 TATSUMI Yukiko 37th Meijin, ladies final |
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Elementary School winner: Masaki Wada Junior High School winner: Satoshi Kurahashi who also won in 2015 Senior High School winner: Akinori Nakaoka |
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37th Meijin:
Date: March 20th
Touney format: 7 rounds and final
Link: JOA website final result, JOA special
Masaya Kasai won the final against Kenta Kiyonobu. I searched for some additional info about Masaya here on Othello News and found that he took second place at the Shinagawa New Year's Open last January which was won by Makoto Suekuni and he was 3rd at the All Japan Championship in July 2015, which was also won by Makoto. According to Ben Seeley, Masaya Kasai is a very strong player who has made quite a name for himself on Playok. The final did not excite Ben too much, it was book until the late endgame for both players. But thanks Ben, for staying up so late and for sending me the transcript of the final.
All the big Othello names were present at the Meijin, but in 2016 we have a fresh new champion: Masaya Kasai. Congratulations!
This video is quite interesting with lots of live images of the board and players, commentaries and interviews (in japanese).
It shows Nakajima vs Murakami, 4th round, Kiyonobu vs Ohike, 5th round and Fukuchi vs Suekuni, 6th round (Fukuchi is the genius who is only 8 years old and has already beaten bunch of former champions in various tournaments.)
Date: March 20th
Touney format: 7 rounds and final
Link: JOA website final result, JOA special
Masaya Kasai won the final against Kenta Kiyonobu. I searched for some additional info about Masaya here on Othello News and found that he took second place at the Shinagawa New Year's Open last January which was won by Makoto Suekuni and he was 3rd at the All Japan Championship in July 2015, which was also won by Makoto. According to Ben Seeley, Masaya Kasai is a very strong player who has made quite a name for himself on Playok. The final did not excite Ben too much, it was book until the late endgame for both players. But thanks Ben, for staying up so late and for sending me the transcript of the final.
All the big Othello names were present at the Meijin, but in 2016 we have a fresh new champion: Masaya Kasai. Congratulations!
This video is quite interesting with lots of live images of the board and players, commentaries and interviews (in japanese).
It shows Nakajima vs Murakami, 4th round, Kiyonobu vs Ohike, 5th round and Fukuchi vs Suekuni, 6th round (Fukuchi is the genius who is only 8 years old and has already beaten bunch of former champions in various tournaments.)
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Top 10 37th Meijin-sen:
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Meijin 2016: Masaya Kasai
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KASAI Masaya 39-25 MURAKAMI Takeshi
37th Meijin, round 5
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KIYONOBU Kenta 27-37 KASAI Masaya 37th Meijin, final |
Masaya Kasai ready for the final
Masaya Kasai (winner) - Kenta Kiyonobu (2nd)
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Helen at WOC 2010 in Rome
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Helen Dexter wins Oadby RegionalLocation: Oadby, UK
Date: March 19th Tourney format: five rounds Congratulations to Helen on winning her first tournament! She did it in style with only wins, no losses. I heard that her game in round 4 against Iain Barrass was an especially interesting game. Let's try to find the transcript! Final scores: Helen Dexter, 5 points Ben Pridmore and Iain Barrass, 3 points Roy Arnol and Steve Rowe, 2 points |
Makoto Suekuni wins Rinkai Challenge CupLocation: Shinagawa, Japan
Date: March 12th Link: Takeshi Murakami blog Tournament format: three divisions, 6 games A great field of players at this tournament as no less than four former World Othello Champions played in Category A: Makoto Suekuni, Kazuki Okamoto, Takeshi Murakami and Tanida Kunihiko (finished 13th with 3 wins). The victory went to Makoto Suekuni who won all his games. Next Sunday the 37th Meijin-sen, who is ready? Top 7 Category A (Advanced, 21 players): 1. Makoto Suekuni 6-0 2. Kazuki Okamoto 5-1 3. Kenta Kiyonobu 5-1 4. Kento Urano 4-2 5. Daisuke Kamikura 4-2 6. Takeshi Murakami 4-2 7. Satoshi Kurahashi 4-2 |
Rinkai Challenge Cup
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SUEKUNI Makoto 44-20 OKAMOTO Kazuki Rinkai Challenge Cup |
SUEKUNI Makoto 34-30 MURAKAMI Takeshi Rinkai Challenge Cup, round 5 |
MURAKAMI, Takeshi 31-33 KIYONOBU Kenta Rinkai Challenge Cup, round 6 |
Kazu Sotohisa wins 85th Sendai OpenLocation: Sendai, Japan
Date: March13th Link: JOA website Tourney format: 6 rounds Kazu Sotohisa won all his games. Runnerup was Kenta Saito with 4 wins and 2 losses. Six players attended this tournament. |
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Maximiliano Axel Pellizzari
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Maximiliano Axel Pellizzari wins Torneo Verano 2016Location: Buenos Aires, Argentina
Date: March 13th Link: FB event page Tourney format: 6 rounds The first Othello tournament in 2016 for the Argentine Othello players. The top 3 qualified for the Argentine Othello Championship. The victory went to Maxi Pellizari with six points. Runner-up Germán Vazquez. Third place for Paula Iturbide, who scored 0.5 point more than Daniel Olivares. Well done Paula! Maxi Pellizzari, 6 points 276 discs Germán Vazquez, 5 points 250 discs Paula Iturbide, 3,5 points 192 discs Daniel Olivares, 3 points 231 discs Max Seifert, 2 points 159 discs Mercedes Cohen, 1 point 122 discs David Nakasone, 0,5 points 114 discs |
Nicky van den Biggelaar wins 80th Dutch Othello Open
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Location: Bussum, Netherlands
Date: March 13th Link: NOV website, LiveOthello Tourney format: 7 rounds, 11 players Nicky van den Biggelaar and Roel Hobo both scored 6 points at this 80th Dutch Othello Open. Too bad for Roel, but Nicky's disccount was just a bit better. Nicky defeated Roel in round 2. Jan de Graaf kept Nicky from a perfect 7 win victory with a 43-21 win in round 4. Results per round can be found here. 
results 80th Dutch Open
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VAN DEN BIGGELAAR Nicky 44-20 HOBO Roel 80th Dutch Othello Open, round 2 |
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DE GRAAF Jan C. 41-23 VAN DEN BIGGELAAR Nicky 80th Dutch Open, round 4 |
HOBO Roel 41-23 DE GRAAF Jan C. 80th Dutch Open, round 5 |
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Ochachi Kitano wins 56th Tatebayashi Open
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Othello Organisation Singapore
We would like to announce that Mr Alex Koh has decided to step down from Othello Organisation Singapore. |
Alex Koh Bo Chao
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Takuji Kashiwabara wins Préqualificatif de Paris
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Location: Paris, France
Date: March 12 - 13th Link: FFO website, LiveOthello Tourney format: 7 rounds, semifinal and final This tourney is a prequalifier for the French WOC team. Préqualificatif is my least favourite French word. Somehow when I type I always get the syllables in the wrong order. My request to the FFO........ plz change the name :) Arnaud Delaunay finished best after 7 rounds with 6 wins and 1 loss. Emmanuel Lazard won 5 games as did Bintsa Andriani. Takuji Kashiwabara scored 4 wins. These four players qualified for the semifinan on Sunday. Bad luck for Thierry Lévi-Abégnoli who won 4 games same as Takuji, but just missed qualification for the semis. Results after 7 rounds: 1: 6 pts [282] DELAUNAY Arnaud (3518) 2: 5 pts [249] LAZARD Emmanuel (11) [240] ANDRIANI Bintsa (45) 4: 4 pts [288] KASHIWABARA Takuji (839) [248] LEVY-ABEGNOLI Thierry (3598) 6: 3 pts [236] BERTRANDIAS Marc (50075) 7: 1 pt [140] TOUCHENE Fouad (9025) {DZA} 8: 0 pt [109] BUSUTTIL Michel (228) Emmanuel Lazard and Takuji Kashiwabara won the semifinals and Takuji won 2-1 in the best of 3 final. Arnaud Delaunay won the playoff for third place against Bintsa Andriani (26 – 38). |
Préquafilicatif?.... Préfiquacatilif?
crosstable 7 rounds
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KASHIWABARA Takuji 31-33 DELAUNAY Arnaud Préqualificatif de Paris, round 1 |
KASHIWABARA Takuji 51-13 LAZARD Emmanuel Préqualificatif de Paris, round 5 |
ANDRIANI Bintsa 35-29 TOUCHENE Fouad Préqualificatif de Paris, round 6 |
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KASHIWABARA 37-27 DELAUNAY Préqualificatif de Paris, semifinal game 3 |
Arnaud Delaunay and Takuji Kashiwabara
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LAZARD 41-23 ANDRIANI Préqualificatif de Paris, semifinal game 1 |
Emmanuel Lazard - Takuji Kashiwabara
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LAZARD 27-37 KASHIWABARA Préqualificatif de Paris, final game 1 |
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KASHIWABARA 30-34 LAZARD Préqualificatif de Paris, final game 2 |
LAZARD 31-33 KASHIWABARA Préqualificatif de Paris, final game 3 |
Vitor Correia wins 1st Torneio de Othello São Jorge
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Location: Nova Odessa, Brazil
Date: March 10th Tourney format: 5 rounds Six players attended this tournament on thursday evening in the Salão da Paróquia do São Jorge. Vitor Correia was the tournament champion. Next tournament day 17/03 at 19 hours. |
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Yusuke Takanashi wins Shinagawa Super League
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Location: Shinagawa, Japan
Date: March 6th Link: Takeshi Murakami blog Tourney format: 7 rounds, 18 qualified players. Great to see Takeshi at the board after a very long stay at the hospital. He is very happy to be able to enjoy Othello again. 1. Yusuke Takanashi 6-1 2. Makoto Suekuni 5-2 3. Jou Nakano 5-2 4. Takeshi Murakami 4-3 5. Tetsuya Nakajima 4-3 note: Othello News readers love to replay games. Please send interesting transcripts with comments to the editor. |
start of the tournament
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KAMIKURA Daisuke 31-33 MURAKAMI Takeshi Shinagawa Super League, round 1 |
MURAKAMI Takeshi 46-18 NAKAJIMA Tetsuya Shinagawa Super League, round 4 |
Yusuke Takanashi - Takeshi Murakami
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MURAKAMI Takeshi 23-41 TAKANASHI Yusuke Shinagawa Super League, round 5 |
Imoto Wataru wins 97th Kanagawa Open
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Location: Kanagawa prefecture, Japan
Date: March 6th Link: JOA website Tourney format: 6 rounds Imoto Wataru won the tournament with 6 wins. Second place for Nobuaki Mitsuya who won 5 games. Also 5 wins for third place winner Hisatoshi Narumi. A total of 33 players participated in this tournament. |
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Lukáš Křenek wins stage 3 Czech Grand Prix Othello
Location: Prague, Czech Republic
Date: March 5th
Link: FB page
Tourney format: 3 rounds
Stage 2 in February had 12 players, but this time only 4 players showed up. Three players finished with 2 points. Winner was Lukáš Křenek, best players under 19 was Filip Černý. Stage 4 is scheduled for April 2nd.
Date: March 5th
Link: FB page
Tourney format: 3 rounds
Stage 2 in February had 12 players, but this time only 4 players showed up. Three players finished with 2 points. Winner was Lukáš Křenek, best players under 19 was Filip Černý. Stage 4 is scheduled for April 2nd.
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Play at the Thailand Othello Championship 2016The Thailand Othello Championship will take plase March 27th. Foreign players are welcome.
How to register? - Send Thailand Othello Association a message on Facebook including: 1. Your firstname-lastname 2. Your World Ratings 3. Your email Deadline for registration 25th March 2016, register fee = 100 THB In case a foreign player becomes champion of this tournament, such player can't be the representative player of Thailand team for WOC2016. |
World Othello Federation Office, get in touch with the WOF
Dear Othello world!
The W.O.F. Office is online at Facebook for chat two days a week.
Office hours (GMT +1:00):
Mondays 8:30-11:30 AM
Thursdays 7:30 - 11:30 PM
If you want direct answers from the Office and W.O.F. you are welcome to write at the Facebook page or send messages or emails. You can also contact us by phone, Skype and other ways:
World Othello Federation Office
Västerlånggatan 56, Inre gården 1tr.
111 29 Stockholm - SWEDEN
Email: office@worldothello.org
Phone, Whatsapp & Line: +46 720 16 52 22
Skype: Knebts
The W.O.F. Office is online at Facebook for chat two days a week.
Office hours (GMT +1:00):
Mondays 8:30-11:30 AM
Thursdays 7:30 - 11:30 PM
If you want direct answers from the Office and W.O.F. you are welcome to write at the Facebook page or send messages or emails. You can also contact us by phone, Skype and other ways:
World Othello Federation Office
Västerlånggatan 56, Inre gården 1tr.
111 29 Stockholm - SWEDEN
Email: office@worldothello.org
Phone, Whatsapp & Line: +46 720 16 52 22
Skype: Knebts
