While Li Xiaoqiang was dreaming of being a master, the "Samsung Cup" qualifiers ushered in the final round of qualifiers.

This kind of large-scale qualifier is like a kind of "undifferentiated" competition, and the participants are former superstars, veterans of the battlefield, adult masters, and young talents. In addition, she is also a female chess player, an amateur chess player, and a European and American chess player. In the past, there were very few such competitions in the world chess world, so it can be said that this kind of competition is also very interesting, and there are many highlights in it.

Especially when it comes to the final qualifiers, if you win, you will be qualified to participate in the "main tournament" of the World Series, so the attention of the tournament is no less than that of the main event of the World Series.

This year's "Samsung Cup" qualifiers are like this, the players who entered the final round of qualifiers are Kato Masao, Takemiya Masaki and other veteran super first-class, but unfortunately Mr. Otake Hero fell in the penultimate round, with the age of Otake Hero, accustomed to the rhythm of Japan's weekly game, such a continuous battle is indeed difficult for him. Due to his defeat, the three veteran Japanese super-top players who participated in the competition did not all survive to the end.

Also entering the final round are adult masters like Liu Dazhu, Cao Dafang, Yamashiro Hiroshi, Hane Yasuma, Liang Zaihao, Xu Nengxu, as well as powerful young chess players like Zhou Dayang and Shao Weigang.

Of course, the most striking of them are the young talents who are only in their teens. There are three new talents in China, Japan and South Korea that have entered the final preliminaries, and most of them are South Korean new talents.

Of the several players sent by the Chinese national junior team, only Kong Erjie entered the final round this time. Gu Dali was eliminated by Hiroshi Yamashiro in the third round. Kong Erjie was still a murderous chess player when he first entered the national junior team, so of course, the national team also specially arranged Liu Dazhui to be his master. Compared with Gu Dali, Kong Erjie can't be said to be stronger now, but his chess is slightly more stable, so it is not surprising that he has the best result in this kind of qualifier.

China is Kong Erjie to enter the final round, and Japan is Zhang Xu to enter the final qualifier. Compared with China and Japan, South Korea has many more young players in the final round. They have Mu Zhenshuo, Li Shishi, Song Taikun and Cui Poison 4 young chess players to the end.

On the day of the final qualifiers, the Chinese Chess Academy, in addition to the chess players who went to South Korea to participate in the competition, including the management of Chinese Go, Li Xiaoqiang, Ma Xiaofei and others were all paying attention to the game in the chess academy.

"The Japanese team has the advantage of veterans, we are Shao Weigang, Zhou Dayang These young chess players are the strongest, and the South Korean team is the most fierce among those children."

Just when everyone was discussing how many admission tickets the Chinese team could get this time, Lao Nie sent such an emotion. Indeed, such a qualifier can be seen as a big competition of "Go thickness" among China, Japan and South Korea. Lao Nie's sentence can be said to basically summarize the current basic structure and situation of the Three Kingdoms chess world.

In the final round, the most eye-catching set was played by Japan's Masaki Takemiya against South Korea's Song Tae-kun. The world's first Go world champion, Japan's veteran superstar against South Korea's up-and-coming talent. This was the most eye-catching game of the round. Korean television also deliberately chose to broadcast the match live.

And in the Chinese Chess Academy, although there are many Chinese players who participated in the final round of the tournament, although there are many other things to watch, most people are choosing to watch this match.

However, this game of chess was not as exciting as imagined, and when the game was about to end, Nie Xuanfeng, who had been paying attention to the game, suddenly sighed: "Alas, it seems that we are really old now......"

Of course, Li Xiaoqiang knew why Lao Nie was emotional. As a peer of Masaki Takemiya, there are no Chinese chess players participating in this game, so emotionally speaking, Lao Nie must have preferred Mr. Takemiya to win. It's just that it backfired, and today's Mr. Wu Gong disappointed Lao Nie.

And the reason why Wu Gong lost today is very simple, this game of chess does not say how well Song Taikun played, and he can't even see his true level from this game of chess. Because of this game he won for only one reason: his opponent made a mistake.

In the first half of the game, Mr. Takemiya's "cosmic flow" was played vigorously, but it is a pity that when the game reached the middle of the game, Mr. Takemiya made a fatal mistake, or a simple omission - the chess with a large appearance is like this, and the most taboo is this kind of omission, because the big pattern is not like other chess, and it is basically irretrievable after the omission occurs.

Today's game of chess is like this, after Mr. Takemiya made a mistake, his big appearance was trampled on, and this chess game has actually ended early. If Mr. Takemiya was a few years younger, he probably wouldn't have made such a mistake. Seeing Wu Gong losing in this way, it is no wonder that Lao Nie "has a relationship with me".

The "Samsung Cup" qualifiers ended like this, and judging from the final results, it seems that it is basically in line with the basic situation of the world chess world today. In the 12 "ordinary groups", the Chinese team won 5 tickets, followed by the South Korean team with 4 and the Japanese team with 3. In addition, in addition to the "international group", the Korean team took away the tickets for the "amateur group". China and Japan divided the two "women's groups", of which Zhang Xuan won one for the Chinese team, and the other was taken by Yukari Umezawa.

Judging from the age structure of the qualifying players, the Japanese team is still basically dominated by veterans, and their three qualifying places are Masao Kato, Hiroshi Yamashiro, and Satoshi Yuuki, who is no longer young. Although Zhang Xu entered the final preliminaries, it was a pity that he, like Kong Erjie, fell at the last hurdle.

The Chinese team was able to snatch the most tickets this time, and the new force was the group of chess players of the same age as Li Xiaoqiang. In addition to Liu Dazhui, the other 4 who won the right to qualify are Shao Weigang, Zhou Dayang, Luo Shenzhu and Ding Wei, all members of the Chinese Go "Eight Horses".

Compared to the Japanese team, the Chinese players are younger, but compared to the Chinese players, the Korean players look younger. In addition to Song Tae-kun, another young chess player, Mu Jin-suk, also snatched a qualifying spot. Young players under the age of 20 account for half of South Korea's qualifying spots, which naturally lowers the average age of Korean players.

Originally, the "Samsung Cup" qualifiers were over, and although it was a very interesting game, it was not the top competition after all. But I didn't expect that a few days later, this competition became a topic again, and this topic seemed to be related to Li Xiaoqiang.

At the end of May 1998, the "Samsung Cup" qualifiers ended, and at the beginning of June, the top 8 matches of the 11th "Fujitsu Cup" were held in Beijing. The "Fujitsu Cup" is a traditional event, so naturally many reporters came to interview, but many reporters did not ask too much about the "Fujitsu Cup", but talked about the "Samsung Cup" qualifiers that had just ended.

The cause was Song Tae-kun, who had just defeated Masaki Takemiya. Probably because of the excitement after the win, when a reporter interviewed him after the game and praised the outstanding performance of the new Korean chess players.

“…… Yes, we plan to spend 5 years to complete the transcendence of Li Xiaoqiang and Li Shifo......"

It would have been nothing for a young man to say two big words. The point is that South Korea is a country that has some strange things to offer. Young people talk big things, and there are even some people who go out of their way to find "arguments" for them.

Of course, they can't be compared with Li Xiaoqiang or Li Shifo now, and there is no comparison at all. So how to find the "argument"? At this time, they brought Mr. Takemiya to talk about it.

"Of course, the current Taikun can't compare with Li Xiaoqiang, and there is a certain gap from all aspects. I admit it's true, but what if you compare Taekun to Li Xiaoqiang in the same period? I don't think Tae-kun will be left behind. You should still have an impression, right? When Li Xiaoqiang first came to prominence on the international stage, he was blocked twice by Mr. Masaki Takemiya. And Tae-kun is now making his first appearance in the World Series, and he won against Mr. Takemiya. Therefore, he said that it would take 5 years to surpass Li Xiaoqiang, and I think it is entirely possible......"

Seeing such arguments, Li Xiaoqiang can only say that some Koreans are strange enough, no wonder they can find so many arguments to prove that they are "the strongest nation in the universe".

What was the situation with Mr. Wu Gong when he was playing against Li Xiaoqiang? That was his pinnacle, the holder of the Japanese "Big Triple Crown" title and a world champion. Is that what the current Martial Palace can compare? Well, even if you don't talk about Mr. Takemiya's age and state.

What was the situation when Li Xiaoqiang and Mr. Wu Gong fought back then? At that time, Li Xiaoqiang challenged Japan's main player in the Sino-Japanese Go Tournament, which was the most important game at that time. It is conceivable that Mr. Takemiya must have attached great importance to it back then, and he could recuperate.

This "Samsung Cup" pre-selection can be compared to the 1-day one-game match? Based on this, can it be considered that Song Taikun is not weaker than Li Xiaoqiang in the same period?

Of course, this kind of bizarre argument is actually not taken seriously, and no one is interested. What everyone is really interested in is Song Taikun's "5-year transcendence wheel".

Most of the reporters who came to cover the Fujitsu Cup this time focused on this issue.

The first thing everyone asked was Li Shifo, because he was his own compatriot, Li Shifo's answer was quite polite:

"5 years ahead of us? Hehe, I think of course it's possible, but it's only the first year after all, it's not ......."

When the reporter's microphone was held up in front of Li Xiaoqiang, Li Xiaoqiang was not so polite, he first said haha to the reporter he was familiar with:

"5 years beyond? Haha it's really good to be young, what is the saying? When young people make mistakes, even God will forgive them......"

"So what do you think of that?"

Li Xiaoqiang's expression became serious:

"Shi Buddha just said that it is very likely to be in 5 years, and I don't agree with him. In five years, they will be qualified to sit in front of me. ”

Li Xiaoqiang's "sit in front of me" does not refer to ordinary competitions, with Li Xiaoqiang's current status, what he says "sit in front of me", of course, at least refers to challenging him in the World Series finals.

"Hehe, it seems that you are not modest at all." The reporter who interviewed Li Xiaoqiang said this.

"I'm not being modest, so let's put it this way, you can interpret my words as a challenge, a challenge to all the junior chess players."

"Ahh

"Yes, not only Song Tae-kun, but also other young Korean chess players. My challenge also includes emerging Chinese and Japanese players, including all the emerging players in the world. This challenge for me is a ...... for all new players."

Li Xiaoqiang continued to smile and said:

"For 5 years, I waited for them to ......" (to be continued. )