[Nongshim Cup] Shibano stops Xie Erhao, Park Junghwan to challenge tomorrow
Shibano Toramaru (left) wins against Xie Erhao (right)
Shibano Toramaru (Black) wins against Xie Erhao (White)
In Game 10 of the 26th Nongshim Cup, Shibano Toramaru, the last man standing in Japan, won against Xie Erhao and stopped him from getting his fourth consecutive win. From the start of the game, Shibano played strong moves, which allowed him to gain an advantage in the opening. However, that advantage didn’t last long and Xie quickly got back the lead in the middle game after Shibano played some loose moves. In the last fight on the right, Shibano played the strongest moves to attack white. When white could’ve sacrificed some stones and played lightly, Xie chose to play strongly instead even though he was deep inside black’s influence. In the end. white had no choice but to start a ko that he couldn’t win, and resigned from the game soon after.
With that, here are the remaining players from each country.
China (2): Li Xuanhao, Ding Hao
Korea (2): Shin Jinseo, Park Junghwan
Japan (1): Shibano Toramaru (1 win)
Game 11 will be played tomorrow 18th Feb at at 3pm KST. The game would be broadcast on most Asian Go servers. There will also be video streams on channels such as BadukTV.
The winning team of Nongshim Cup will receive a prize of 500 million won. An additional prize of 10 million won will be awarded for three consecutive wins (an additional 10 million won will be paid for each additional win after three consecutive wins). Each player is given one hour of thinking time with one 60-second overtime.
How far will Shibano Toramaru go? Stay tuned to find out!