Today is the day when the fianl (third) game of the forty second Rookie of the Year tourney is being held between 6-dan Toyoshima Masayuki and 6-dan Sato Amahiko. The venue is at Japan Shogi Association's building in Sendagaya, Tokyo. Before the game, the score is tied in 1-1. The winner of this game will be the Rookie of the year. Since this is the last chance for the both players to be the best Rookie since they will lose the permission to enter it in the next term due to promoting to 6-dan already. So they must want to be the winner to graduate it with honor. Let's see who will be the one.
The opening was likely to go to Yokofutori. But Toyoshima, who got Sente as a result of Furigoma, did not pick up the Side Pawn and retrieve his Rook back to 2f. Sato drew his Rook back to its original square of 8b. It surprized me that Toyoshima moved his Rook to 3f to threaten to take the Pawn on 3d vertically after he dropped a defensive pawn on his Bishop's head of 8g. It is different from Hineribisha(Twisting Rook) where Sente moved his Rook to the 3rd, and then 7th or 8th files without dropping a Pawn on 8g. In fact, there is no precedent at the position of the 26th move of K-4b. It seems that they are trying to decide which will be a instinctively tougher fighter in an untapped field on this particular opportunity, rather than following to one of the paved roads of Joseki which they can study in advance at home to fairly deep extent.
You can replay and watch the game through the official live-board at
Since the allotted thinking time is three hours per player and it started at 10:00am(JST), the game will end after 4:00pm(JST). Here is the official site of the Rookie of the Year Tourney. And a chat environment is with watching a slightly-deferred-live-board is ready at 81dojo.
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