Home > Steve > Go > Problem of the month

August 2002's Go Answer of the Month


Dia 1 - Black to play.

Dia 1

I came across this in Zagreb where some DFKs were looking through a Cyrillic problem book. The answer is harder to find than you might think.


What needs to be considered? The black group on the left has only three liberties - the same number as the right half of the white group. Black needs to capture the white stones quickly.

Dia 2 - Try a hane on the right to start with.

Dia 2 9 takes ko at 5.

Many of these moves are forced. White lives and the black stones in the corner live or die, hemmed in, in ko 3-2 and 4-2 points . The central black stones are now a bit weaker, so this is not a good result.

Note that this only worked for white because of the weakness at 8. Black can improve on this result...


Dia 3 - Try the vital 3-1 point.

Dia 3 5 at 3, 6 at 1.

9 is atari. Disaster for White, hooray! But can White do better?

Dias 4 & 5 - A better white 2.

Dia 4   Dia 5 12 is an external ko threat, 13 a ko answer, 14 retakes ko at triangle, 15 an external ko threat, 17 at 11.

Dia 5 shows the ko being won by White. If Black wins the ko, he just takes the white stones off.


Conclusion.

The best that Black can do appears to be a ko.


Home > Steve > Go > Problem of the month
British Go Association
Last updated 2004-08-10
This page is part of http://www.stocton.org/
Email: webmaster@stocton.org