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Yoda Norimoto seems to be tired from normal Go
Yoda Norimoto, 9-dan is one of my favorite Go professionals. He surprised me a lot by playing his first move (as White) on the middle of the side. I checked my database and can confirm that this is the first move in pro Go history (in important tournaments, at least). There are only few examples of playing this way as Black (as the first move), but nobody used it as White.
Yoda is famous for his good yose and many Go players think that he is very good at peaceful games, so it's strange to see him using such ideas. I also remember that sometimes he plays at 6-4 point, but not in important matches.
Daiwa cup is not a big tournament, so it seems that Yoda decided to have fun, instead of playing the normal game.
As you can see, after first 50 moves the game looks like 2-3 stones handicap game! Really hard for White to win it!
Yoda managed to make it close. He only lost by 3.5 points.
Enjoy the show and don't repeat such moves - they cannot be good, even if they played by 9-dan professionals!
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