Introduction

For this week’s meditation, we really get to see a very popular joseki choice (i.e., small knight dive after one space low approach to the star point) get demolished (globally). Though it is certainly still an option in certain fuseki, it has fallen out of favor with me and I don’t really see it as a viable move anymore in today’s metagame because it gives your opponent the opportunity to choose what’s best for him: (1) Take corner? (2) Take side? (3) Tenuki. Not a pleasant feeling at all…

Aside from that though, this is a game that is full of fighting spirit from both sides with a constant push and pull to gain the initiative. And because this game is shorter than the typical game I normally feature, I would recommend that you take more time to solve the problems in the kifu. There are two in particular: (1) a ladder and (2) life and death. Hope you enjoy the review!

Thanks to Zak for letting me use our game and helping out with figuring out some of the key variations. Looking forward to our next one!



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One Point Lesson

Having anything more than one weak group at a time will make for a difficult game.