START OF ROUND 2 - unseeded players only:

(1 Sep)

Finishing at 3 am UK time, Neal Bolton (GBR) just beat Robin Brown (NZL) by 44.9-35.1 TPs - he will play no. 28 seed Heli Niemi (FIN) in R3.

(5 Sep)

In the biggest shock of the Championship so far, the 2001 Pan-American Champion went out when Ilona Halbach (GER) beat Brad Swanlund (USA) (a perennial slow starter in tournaments) by 52.5-27.5 TPs to meet no. 22 seed Murray Pharaoh (NZL) in R3.

(8 Sep)

Leah Sanders (AUS) made short work of Peter Clay (AUS), beating him by 43.1-16.9 TPs inside the distance to meet no. 26 seed Alexei Drummond (NZL) in R3.

Garry Laishley (AUS) lost game 1 but beat Josh Button (AUS) by 50.7-29.3 TPs to meet no. 27 seed Philippe Durand (FRA) in R3.


ROUND 2 CONTINUES, ROUND 3 STARTS:

(9 Sep)

In a very early start to R3, no. 28 seed Heli Niemi (FIN) beat Neal Bolton (GBR) by 63.0-37.0 TPs, winning the first four of their five games. In R4, Heli will play no. 8 seed Laurent Berguin (FRA), one of only two players (along with Steven Trezise (GBR)) to have come in the top 8 in all three previous WTCs.

In R2, Graeme Jolliffe (AUS) came from behind twice to edge through against Simon Wright (GBR) by just 41.1-38.9 TPs. In R3, Graeme will play no. 17 seed Jérôme Papillon (FRA) for the doubtful privilege of playing the reigning champion in R4.

Yan Moulin (FRA) beat János Püspöki (HUN) by 50.5-29.5 TPs and plays no. 25 seed Pierre Sanchez (FRA) in R3.

(10 Sep)

Brett Randall (AUS) beat Zoltan Nedeczky (HUN) by just 40.2-39.8 TPs, effectively by a single tile, to play no. 23 seed Dave Dyer (USA) in R3.

Luis Morfín (MEX) beat John Waggott (GBR) by 44.0-36.0 TPs. In a match which was level after game 3, the players were either side of the time limit in the long, nerve-wracking final game. Luis next plays no. 20 seed Martin Harlow (GBR), who by coincidence introduced John to Tantrix and lives only a couple of miles away from him, but thousands of miles away from Luis. Will the 'teacher' fare better than the 'pupil' against the dangerous unseeded Mexican?

Marc Abramson (FRA) beat Jeffrey Simpson (NZL) 45.6-14.4 TPs within the distance in 22 m - next for Marc is no. 31 seed László Harsanyi (HUN) in R3.

Franky Heyer (FRA) was 2 games down but recovered to beat Kristina Chilton (NZL) by 41.7-38.3 TPs. Franky will face no. 24 seed José Luis Cortina (MEX) in R3.

(10-11 Sep)

Damon Horrell (NZL) lost game 1 heavily but won all three remaining games to beat Sam Howard (AUS) convincingly by 50.4-29.6 TPs. Damon will play no. 21 seed Wolfgang Schwarz (GER) in R3.

(12 Sep)

Kathy Upton (AUS) won all 4 games to beat Jukka Heikkilä (FIN) by 63.5-16.5 TPs and will meet no. 32 seed Ragnar Wikman (FIN) in R3.

(13 Sep)

Having caused the biggest 'upset' of the tournament before today by beating the Pan American Champion, Ilona Halbach (GER) caused an even bigger shock when she beat no. 22 seed and 2000 Pacific Champion Murray Pharaoh (NZL) in R3. Ilona won game 1 by one tile, lost games 2 and 3 heavily, won game 4 by four tiles and, needing a win by three tiles or more, won 20-15 in game 5. Ilona now faces an even tougher challenge - no. 6 seed and NZ Champion Shaun Cooper (NZL) awaits her in R4.

(13-14 Sep)

Pamela Wiley (USA) defeated Thierry Berguin (FRA) by 56.5-23.5 TPs and will meet no. 18 seed Kevin Scott (GBR) in R3.

(15 Sep)

In R3, no. 21 seed Wolfgang Schwarz (GER) won four of the five games to beat Damon Horrell (NZL) by 65.6-34.4 TPs. Wolfgang will play no. 12 seed and 1999 WTC runner-up Jamie Sneddon (NZL) in what may well be one of the best matches in R4.

Alida Remiens (NZL) beat Bronwyn Venus (AUS) by 51.7-28.3 TPs to meet no. 30 seed Lutz Göhmann (GER) in R3.

In R3, Garry Laishley (AUS) beat no. 27 seed and European runner-up Philippe Durand (FRA) by 55.9-44.1 TPs. In a crazy match, every game was decided by a high margin - the average winning margin per game being no less than 15 tiles! Garry, the first tournament debutant to reach the last 32 this year, will play no. 5 seed Ben Polman (NED) next, Philippe just missing out on the chance of a rematch against his conqueror in the 2001 European Championship Final.

In R3, no. 17 seed Jérôme Papillon (FRA) won the first three games to lead Graeme Jolliffe (AUS) by 47.0-13.0 TPs.

(16 Sep)

No. 17 seed Jérôme Papillon (FRA) finished off a win against Graeme Jolliffe (AUS) by 67.4-32.6 TPs. In the last 32, Jérôme will look for revenge for defeat by 2000 champion and no. 1 seed Julia Schwarz (GBR) at the same stage stage last year. Last year it was Julia who was seeded just outside the top 16 and thus had a bit of match practice before their match, this year the positions are reversed.

In R3, no. 32 seed Ragnar Wikman (FIN) rode his luck superbly to beat Kathy Upton (AUS) comprehensively by 66.6-33.4 TPs in the longest match of the tournament so far at 1 h 55 m. Ragnar will play Australian Champion and no. 15 seed Matt Mayoh (AUS) in the last 32.

Still in R3, no. 24 seed José Luis Cortina (MEX) lost game 1 but won games 2-4 to beat Franky Heyer (FRA) within the distance by 53.6-26.4 TPs. José Luis, the 2000 WTC Plate runner-up, will play no. 4 seed and 2001 Pacific Championship runner-up Bevan Chong (NZL) in the last 32.

Chris Dellaway (NZL), the lowest-ranked player left, managed the most amazing comeback win against Jim Tarsi (USA) in R2. Jim was 32.2-07.8 up at halfway. Although Chris won game 3, in game 4 Jim only needed to stop Chris winning by 27 or more to go through. Hardly worth playing the game, you would have thought ... until Chris won the fateful game by 54-26 ... 28 tiles. Chris now faces another American, no. 29 seed Steven Wiley (USA), in R3.

Starting his R3 match a few hours later, Chris Dellaway (NZL) lost game 1 but won games 2 and 3 to lead no. 29 seed Steven Wiley (USA) by 37.9-22.1 TPs after 3 games.

(17 Sep)

Kevin Scott (GBR) won all three games to take a big 44.8-15.2 TPs lead over Pamela Wiley (USA) in R3.

(18 Sep)

In the final R2 match, Marion Scott (GBR) recovered from two games (11.2-28.8 TPs) down to beat Raymond Hemmecke (GER) by 42.1-37.9 TPs. Completing a good 24 hrs for the Scotts, Marion will play no. 19 seed Irene Dyer (USA) in R3.


ROUND 2 NOW COMPLETE, ROUND 3 (seeds 17-32 join) CONTINUES:

(18 Sep)

No. 31 seed László Harsányi (HUN) scraped through v Marc Abramson (FRA), who had beaten him narrowly in Euro Group C earlier in the year. László needed a win by ten tiles in game 5 after Marc had won close games 1, 2 & 4, László having won game 3 by 12. László won game 5 by 25-14 to become (we think) only the second player after compatriot Péter Petrecz (HUN) to lose three games but still win a five-game match by winning the other two games by very high margins. He now plays no. 3 seed & Pacific Champion Britta Steude (NZL) in R4.

No. 25 seed Pierre Sanchez (FRA) leads by 38.5-21.5 TPs against compatriot Yan Moulin (FRA) - these players had a close two-game match earlier this year in Euro Group B which Yan won, though Pierre won Group B as a whole.

(19 Sep)

Alida Remiens (NZL) leads no. 30 seed Lutz Göhmann (GER) by 24.2-15.8 TPs after 2 games - she won 50-26 in game 1 while Lutz won game 2 by a much lower margin.

No. 29 seed Steven Wiley (USA) won the last 2 games v Chris Dellaway (NZL) to overtake him, winning the match by 52.1-47.9 TPs. In R4, Steven will play no. 11 seed and Tantrix inventor Mike McManaway (NZL), who came 4th in the World Championship last year.

No. 18 seed Kevin Scott (GBR) completed a merciless 78.6-21.4 TPs thrashing of Pamela Wiley (USA), winning all five games. In the last 32, Kevin will play no. 9 seed Phil Sneddon (NZL), who will probably not now be looking forward to their match!

It is now GER 3-0 NZL in R3 after no. 30 seed Lutz Göhmann (GER) beat Alida Remiens (NZL) by 60.2-39.8 TPs. Lutz won the last four games, though (having won game 1 by 50-26) Alida still had a outside chance of winning the match in game 5. In R4, Lutz will play no. 13 seed Péter Petrecz (HUN), a player who has consistently been in the top three in the European Championship.

(20 Sep)

No. 25 seed Pierre Sanchez (FRA) beat compatriot Yan Moulin (FRA) by just 50.3-49.7 TPs. Yan won both games in the last session to win three of the five games overall, but Pierre had high margin wins in games 1 and 3 which allowed him to scrape through to the next round. Pierre is the third player ever to win a five-game match having lost three games, just two days after László Harsányi (HUN) became the second! The unfortunate Yan won the two-game match against Pierre in 2001 Euro Group B but Pierre won Group B as a whole. Pierre will play no. 10 seed Yoseph Phillips (ISR) (5th in 1999 WTC as Justin Phillips (NZL)) in the last 32.

(21 Sep)

Tournament first-timer Brett Randall (AUS) beat no. 23 seed Dave Dyer (USA) by 53.1-46.9 TPs. Dave won games 4 & 5 but could not quite recover after Brett's fine start, winning all of the first three games. Brett plays compatriot & no. 7 seed Andrew Swan (AUS) in R4, so AUS is sure to have a player in the last 16. This is the first time Dave, who is always hard to beat (and incidentally programs the applet that lets us all play online in the first place), has not reached the last 32, but the Australian success story in this WTC continues. The AUS won/lost record is now 14-7, cf NZL 8-12, GBR 4-7, USA 3-7. GER with 5-2 and MEX with 2-0 have done better but from less than ten matches.

(22 Sep)

No. 19 seed Irene Dyer beat Marion Scott (GBR) very convincingly by 69.8-30.2 TPs, winning games 1, 2, 3 and 5 and losing game 4 by only one tile. In the last 32, Irene will play no. 14 seed Matt Peek (NZL) in what should be a very even match.


ROUND 3 DRAWS TO A CLOSE, A ROUND 4 MATCH STARTS EARLY:

The R4 match between no. 4 seed Bevan Chong (NZL) and no. 24 seed José Luis Cortina (MEX) began today before the official start of R4 on Tuesday because Bevan has exams in the near future. Bevan won game 1 by two tiles.

Game 2 was astonishing - there was great play on both sides, but José Luis had a dreadful run of luck with the tiles for most of the game and was trailing badly towards the end. He needed an unlikely miracle and tried to form a loop, his only chance.

Bevan created a lookalike for the vital tile José needed to complete the loop but had another tile which fitted that space, so at the same time had to create a run of forced spaces. He did this expertly, and was able to create and fill enough other forced spaces in the chain to pick up nine of the last ten tiles ... José's miracle was that the tile Bevan needed to waste was the tenth one! Bevan had to play the other tile in the vital lookalike space before picking up the crucial tile and having to complete José's loop to give him the game by 26-20 and a narrow lead in the match.

In game 3, Bevan started with probably the best line-building seen in this year's WTC so far. However, tempted by the possibility of a 20-tile loop which looked on quite early in the game, he ended up with both ends of his line blocked on the same controlled side while José built his line longer and longer. In the end, Bevan nearly managed the loop, but not quite, and José took the game 33-22 to lead by 37.8-22.2 TPs.

The final session is scheduled for Monday at 02.30 GMT / 14.30 NZT / 21.30 (Sunday) CDT.

(23 Sep)

Unseeded Leah Sanders (AUS) is through to the last 32 after no. 26 seed Alexei Drummond (NZL) withdrew/defaulted after two no-shows in their match. Alexei has now been the only player to spoil the record of getting all matches played in the seeded rounds for two years in a row. Apologies to all of you for allowing him to take part this year, especially since he denied a valuable seeding place to someone else, but since he played in (and indeed won) the Plate last year, it was assumed that the problem in the 2000 main draw had been a one-off.

Nothing should be taken away from Leah, who looked strong in her first two matches and may well have beaten Alexei anyway. In the last 32, she will play 1998 World Champion and no. 2 seed Steven Trezise (GBR), 3rd last year too but disappointing in this year's European Championship when he just failed to qualify for the knockout phase.

(24 Sep)

A day of huge shocks to start R4! As usual, the 'upsets' start in earnest once the lower seeds get to take a pop at the top seeds.

No. 24 seed José Luis Cortina (MEX) resumed 37.8-22.2 TPs up against no. 4 seed Bevan Chong (NZL) and while Bevan won game 4 so that it all depended on the final game, José won that by two tiles to complete a famous victory. In the first session, Bevan was at times playing like a potential World Champion, but José was also playing the best he has probably ever played and skilfully took full advantage of Bevan's shocking bad luck at the end of game 2 and an inadvisable risk which did not come off in game 3 - enough in the final analysis to end the no. 4 seed's interest in the tournament by 56.2-43.8 TPs.

More was to follow, as no. 28 seed Heli Niemi (FIN) unceremoniously dumped no. 8 seed Laurent Berguin (FRA) out of the tournament, ending his record of always being in the top eight in the World Championship. Heli reeled off the first four games to take an unassailable 61.5-18.5 TPs lead before Laurent's consolation win in game 5 left the final score 65.7-34.3 TPs to Heli, who used up an average of less than 5 minutes per game. It looks like the match might have hinged around game 3, where Heli took 8 minutes and Laurent lost two time penalties.

With both of the top 8 seeds in the third quarter of the draw knocked out today, this section of the draw now looks wide open.

In the remaining R3 match, no. 20 seed Martin Harlow (GBR) leads Luis Morfín (MEX) by 30.6-9.4 TPs after winning both games by the same score, 15-9. This equals the record for the lowest tile score in a game twice over! The final session is scheduled for Tuesday 25 September at 17.00 GMT / 18.00 BST / 12.00 MexDT.

(25 Sep)

No. 20 seed Martin Harlow (GBR) finished off Luis Morfín (MEX), in the end winning all five games to take the match by 74.1-25.9 TPs and fill the remaining place in R4. This was the longest match of the Championship so far at 1 h 56 m. Martin and no. 18 seed Kevin Scott (also GBR) are the only players to have won all five games in their R3 matches. They both reached the QFs of the European Championship too, knocking out the current World Champion in Group A in the process, and coincidentally Martin's next opponent is no. 16 seed Jacques-Olivier Haenni (SUI), who edged Kevin out at the QF stage in that event.


ROUND 3 NOW COMPLETE, ROUND 4 (seeds 1-16 join) CONTINUES:

(27 Sep)

No. 6 seed and NZ Champion Shaun Cooper (NZL) won the first two games against unseeded giant-killer Ilona Halbach (GER) but Ilona took game 3 by a single tile to retain chances in the match. Shaun is 36.8-23.2 TPs ahead.

(28 Sep)

THE PLATE, run by Phil Sneddon, starts today with 8 entrants from the UK, 7 from New Zealand, 6 from France, 5 from Australia, 4 from USA, 2 from Hungary and 1 each from Turkey, Germany, Mexico and Switzerland. This is just the preliminary round for those who were knocked out in the first three rounds of the World Championship. The better players do in these matches, the more likely they are to get byes in the first round proper when those who lose in Round 4 of the WTC join the competition. The Plate will not be covered in detail here (for lack of time) but it has its own site, courtesy of Paul Martinsen and Phil.

No. 17 seed Jérôme Papillon (FRA) won the first game against no. 1 seed and defending champion Julia Schwarz (GBR) by a single tile in a game where he always had his nose just ahead. Last year Julia was the no. 19 seed and she beat the then no. 10 seed Jérôme by 64-36 TPs in the last 32 (in her second match and his first) on her way to winning the World Championship. This year the rôles are reversed and Jérôme, who has the benefit of a big win in R3 behind him, is looking for revenge. Further two-game sessions are scheduled for Saturday at 16.00 GMT / 17.00 BST / 18.00 CET and Tuesday 2 October at 17.00 GMT / 18.00 BST / 19.00 CET.

The winner of that match will play no. 13 seed Péter Petrecz (HUN) in the last 16. He beat no. 30 seed Lutz Göhmann (GER) by 57.8-42.2 TPs, drawing the first game and losing the last but winning games 2, 3 and 4. German players have been doing very well in this tournament and this is the first match one of them has lost since Round 1. Péter reached the last 16 in the last two World Championships as well - will 2001 be the year he reaches the quarter-finals for the first time?

(29 Sep)

A disaster day for the top 8 seeds as, following the no. 4 and no. 8 seeds' exits earlier in the week, seeds 1, 2 and 5 between them have now played ten games in 24 hours and lost all ten of them!

Only four unseeded players have made it to the last 32 this year. Three of the four are Australians and, as flagged in an earlier report, two of them had the chance to cause a real stir today. They were not about to let that chance go.

First up was unseeded Leah Sanders (AUS), playing no. 2 seed Steven Trezise (GBR). The first game was very nervy on both sides, and crazy at the end. Skillfully taking full advantage of her opponent's lack of tiles of his own colour early in the game, Leah forced Steven to watch with his short lines blocked as she steadily grew her own line. Then, about 20-12 up, she appeared to hand him a lifeline by adding to her line but letting him make an 11-tile loop at the same time. In a classic case of 'dumb then dumber', Steven (in time trouble) carefully checked both the tiles that would complete his loop, one of which would have allowed him to block Leah as well ... then played the wrong one! Leah won by 26-22.

In game 2, Steven started off well but got blocked again and Leah did very well to gain a small advantage, which she held until the end, when having spent a long time trying to rescue the game, Steven messed up the endgame spectacularly in dire time trouble and gifted Leah a 9-tile win when he should have kept the margin much smaller. Leah now leads by 30.7-9.3 TPs and probably only needs to win one of the last three games to cause the biggest shock of the tournament so far.

If that was not shocking enough, unseeded Garry Laishley (AUS) stunned European Champion and no. 5 seed Ben Polman (NED) by winning all five games against him to record a massive 72.9-27.1 TPs victory. The last three games were all decided by one or two tiles, but big wins for Garry in the first two games meant that Ben was always chasing the match from then on and never really looked like coming back.

The reigning champion and no. 1 seed Julia Schwarz (GBR) was the next to feel the heat. She had been handed the worst possible draw against no. 17 seed Jérôme Papillon (FRA), the player she least likes to play and the top player among those seeded 17-32, out for revenge after his defeat by her at this stage last year. Hence it was always expected to be a hard start to her defence of her title. Having lost the first game by one tile yesterday, Julia had even more of a disaster today. Game 2 was a nightmare for the champion, with the tiles distinctly not going her way and Jérôme playing extremely well to win 28-17.

Now under tremendous pressure, Julia made a great start to game 3, building a long line very effectively. Then came the crucial blunder - she knew she had to stop Jérôme from completing a potentially large loop, but after finding a way to add yet more tiles to her own line, forgot to take that into account as she played the tile! Some clever play afterwards nearly saved her, but the tiles did not come out in the right order for her desperate plan to work and Jérôme got his loop to win the game 46-30 and lead the match by 47.0-13.0 TPs. Jérôme could lose the last two games by 30 tiles each and still win the match, so Julia's defence of the title is surely going to end at the first hurdle. The match concludes on Tuesday 2 October at 17.00 GMT / 18.00 BST / 19.00 CET.

Themes

Two themes emerge from the most newsworthy day of the Championship so far. The first is the resurgence of Jérôme Papillon. He was once one of the very best players in the world, indeed he was the runner up in the 1998 World Championship, and those of us with a long history against him always know we are in for the hardest of battles when we play him. However, he had a bad time in tournaments last year and his form hit a trough in the European Championship in June this year when he only finished 5th out of 6 in his qualification group which led to his drop out of the top 16 seeds, if only just. Whether that served as a wake-up call or whether he has just found some form again, the evidence of today's match and his recent lobby play suggests that Jérôme is now back at his best at exactly the right time.

The other theme is the structure of the draw and its effect on the top seeds. The top 16 start in the round of the last 32 for two reasons - firstly to give the weaker players the chance to win a couple of matches rather than many of them being cannon fodder for the big guns in Round 1 and never wanting to enter another tournament as a result ... and secondly to stop those most likely to be playing a lot of long matches towards the end of the competition from having to play so many WTC games that it becomes tedious.

Seeds 17-32 start in the previous round and it usually seems to be the case that there is a wide gulf between the lower seeds and the unseeded players, and the unseeded players tend to get knocked out in that round, bar a very few strong tournament débutants (four this year) who prove how strong they are by making it through.

Round 4 is very different though, because for the last couple of years the strength of the lower seeds (and by extension the few unseeded players who get that far) has been such that even if they are not quite as strong as the top 8 or 16 (of course, in some cases they are no doubt stronger since no seeding system is perfect!), they are more than well enough equipped to take full advantage of any nervous first match errors made by the top players and if the run of the tiles goes their way - something most of the weaker unseeded players do not seem so capable of doing in the round before.

So, the top players, nervous and under pressure to perform in their first match, and with little scope for error in matches of only five games (panic can set in after a first game loss in such circumstances and lose the first two and your back is really against the wall!), are now faced with the certainty of meeting a strong player who is already well into swing of the tournament. These opponents are probably nervous too, but are under less pressure with everything to go for and nothing to lose, and with at least one confidence boosting win under their belt already, maybe even two or three for the top unseeded players.

Many of the top players are slow starters anyway - just taking the example of today's disaster-prone players, Julia and Steven had their biggest scares in last year's WTC against unseeded players in their first matches before coming 1st and 3rd respectively and Ben was in dire straits at the start of the 2001 European Championship before getting his act together and reaching the QFs by the skin of his teeth and eventually winning the tournament.

Is it any wonder the top 16 are getting into such a mess against stronger first match opposition than ever this year? ... are the early round byes finally proving to be more of a disadvantage than an advantage? ... and how many more of the top seeds are going to fall at the first hurdle - will it be more than half of them? Stay tuned ...

(29 Sep, continued from above)

Late in the day, no. 9 seed Phil Sneddon (NZL) struck a blow for the top 16, winning games 2 and 3 against no. 18 seed Kevin Scott (GBR) after a draw in game 1 to lead their match by 40.0-20.0 TPs.

(30 Sep)

No. 14 seed Matt Peek (NZL) staged a remarkable recovery against no. 19 seed Irene Dyer (USA) to win by 59.2-40.8 TPs. Irene looked to be coasting after winning the first two games but then as Irene had to contend with connection problems, Matt won game 3 under pressure. Game 4 turned out to be crucial. Irene went just over the time limit as she tried to find a way to turn it around but Matt won by 5 tiles to go ahead in the match, before winning his third game in a row to make sure of qualification for the next round. Matt will play unseeded giant-killer Garry Laishley, who has already won four matches to get this far, in a trans-Tasman showdown in the last 16.

No. 10 seed Yoseph Phillips (ISR) is locked in a long, tight battle for supremacy with no. 25 seed Pierre Sanchez (FRA). Yoseph won the first game 21-17, Pierre won the second by a single tile, 24-23, but lost a time penalty and Yoseph won the third by the same score to leave him 35.7-24.3 TPs ahead. The final session is scheduled for Tuesday 2 October at the same time.

(1 Oct)

No. 16 seed Jacques-Olivier Haenni (SUI), 4th in the European Championship this year, is just ahead of no. 20 seed Martin Harlow (GBR) by 31.6-28.4 TPs after an eventful and exciting first session. Possibly going for a big loop early in game 1, Martin ended up blocked along a controlled side, allowing Jacques-Olivier to run away with the game 26-15. In game 2, Martin again ended up with both ends on the same side, possibly going for another big loop. It didn't come off, but this time Martin didn't end up completely blocked and Jacques-Olivier did, along two controlled sides on opposite sides of the Tantrix, and Martin won that game 27-19.

Game 3 was as tense as they come. Just for a change, Martin went for a big loop and this time he ended up blocked at both ends again. A smaller loop materialised elsewhere on the Tantrix scoring 20 but Jaco had two open lines over 15 tiles long which looked very likely to be lengthened or even joined together. With only two tiles left in the bag, Martin spent over 5 minutes weighing up the options and eventually managed to keep the two lines disconnected to force a 20-20 draw, though the thinking time needed for that crucial move did result in him losing a TP by going over the time limit by just one second. Jacques-Olivier leads by just 31.6-28.4 TPs overall, so it will be all to play for in the final session, scheduled for Thursday 4 October at 13.00 GMT / 14.00 BST / 15.00 CET.

Talking point:

A little bit of analysis for the interested reader to consider, though you will have to review the game (jaco-RufusT-2001-10-02-1438) for it to make any sense. Could Martin have been a bit bolder and won game 3 of the match described above? Watching the game at the crucial point with two tiles left in the bag (after move 42), I noticed that there was one BYB tile left in the bag, which I calculated to be BYBYRR. I thought Martin should play the BGB of his BGBGYY tile across the tile at the bottom right-hand corner of the Tantrix - a move which he did actually experiment with along with a dozen others. This move would have created a BYR lookalike for the BYBYRR tile just above itself and a BYB forced space just below it. Had Martin been able to waste the BYB tile in the lookalike space, he would have blocked Jacques-Olivier in three different ways - only one of these blocks occurred after his actual move:

a) The bottom of the right-hand blue line ("RHL"), now ending in a BYB forced space, would have been blocked - this was the end Jacques-Olivier managed to add three tiles to afterwards.

b) After the other tile left in the bag had filled the forced space at the top of the RHL, the link between the RHL and the blue line over the top of the Tantrix was a BYB forced space and would therefore have been blocked.

c) The link between the blue line over the top of the Tantrix and the left-hand blue line was also a BYB forced space and would have been blocked - this ended up being filled with the BYB tile in the actual game.

Hence, the RHL would have been limited to just 17 and the left-hand blue line to 10 plus whatever could have been added to the free end and Martin would have won by 3 tiles.

Remember of course that I had the luxury of being able to spot what could be a winning move and look only at that whereas Martin had to consider all possibilities (not just an interesting one that might not come off!) under severe time pressure and with nerves jangling, but hopefully you found this interesting. Of course, if I missed something and the plan does not work, please let me know!

(2 Oct)

No. 17 seed Jérôme Papillon (FRA) completed his victory over defending champion and no. 1 seed Julia Schwarz (GBR) by 57.2-42.8 TPs. However, Julia salvaged some pride by winning both of today's games and by achieving the only target realistically left to her, i.e. cutting the margin down to less than the 64-36 TPs by which she beat Jérôme at the same stage last year.

In game 4, Julia says that with the pressure now off, she "finally remembered how I played last year". With moves 5 and 9, she blocked both ends of Jérôme's line with GBG forced spaces and while two GBGs came out of the bag quite quickly, that held Jérôme up for just long enough for Julia to get her nose ahead as they both quickly built their lines. By move 30 though, Jérôme was 16-15 ahead and both players had the lower ends of their lines blocked next to each other on a long controlled side. Then Julia found what was probably the winning move. Having counted that four GBYs were already on the Tantrix and she held the last one in her hand, she played it at the top left corner, creating a now unfillable GBY forced space at the top end of Jérôme's line and forcing a tile which took her own line to 20, finally winning 24-17.

After 20 moves of game 5, Julia's position looked like that of a beginner, with 11 of her tiles wasted in small loops. This was mainly the result of getting some abysmal tiles at the start of the game and the way she recovered from that start to win the game was definitely the mark of a champion, not a beginner. With little of her own colour on her tiles, she set out to waste as many of Jérôme's tiles as possible in a second blue line, always making sure that he could not connect it to his main line. The plan worked and she won the final game 21-18. "I should have played like that at the weekend, but I forgot to," was the only way Julia could find to sum up the match.

After his great performance at the weekend though, Jérôme marches on. By the end of the day, he was to be the only French player (of the 11 who entered) left in the tournament. In the last 16, he will play another old adversary, no. 13 seed Péter Petrecz (HUN), in what promises to be a cracker of a match.

It will not come as any surprise to those who played in the 1999 World Championship that the match involving no. 10 seed Yoseph Phillips (ISR), which concluded today, was the first match this year to take more than two hours. The recorded time would have been even longer had Yoseph and no. 25 seed Pierre Sanchez (FRA) not agreed to waive a number of time penalties which they could each have claimed in today's games. It was a great match though, Yoseph coming into today's session 35.7-24.3 TPs ahead and ending up the winner by just 54.9-45.1 TPs after the players won one close game each today.

Yoseph may not have played in a tournament for more than a year after his move from New Zealand to Israel, but he is clearly still a force to be reckoned with. In the last 16, he will face no. 28 seed Heli Niemi (FIN) - not the opponent he probably expected when he saw the draw, but a tough challenge all the same.

(3 Oct)

No. 3 seed and Pacific Champion Britta Steude (NZL) had a minor scare at the start of her match against no. 31 seed László Harsanyi (HUN), losing the first game by four tiles. She came back to win game 2 by the same margin, so they are locked together at 20.0-20.0 TPs after the first session, with the match due to be finished on Saturday.

(4 Oct)

No. 21 seed Wolfgang Schwarz (GER), the brother of last year's World Champion (who provided most of the analysis of this match below), was looking to take another big step towards keeping the trophy in the family when he tried to topple no. 12 seed and 1999 World runner-up Jamie Sneddon (NZL) in what always looked like being a tight match.

In the first game, it was 9-9 after 15 moves, then Jamie got his nose in front before ending up blocked at both ends, allowing Wolfgang to take a small lead. Wolfgang's move 29 left Jamie a choice of forced spaces in Wolfgang's line to fill with one of his tiles. Had Jamie used that tile to fill the space on the top right of the Tantrix (which another of his tiles fitted too) instead of filling the one on the top left, he would have left a gap in Wolfgang's line which there was only one tile left to fill, a tile for which there was already a lookalike at the bottom of the Tantrix.

Jamie did find a very neat play at move 40 though, forcing Wolfgang to fill a space with the last tile with RBB on it which at the same time created a space at the end of Wolfgang's line needing a RBB tile. With all the tiles out of the bag, Wolfgang was 21-18 ahead but only had one unblocked end to Jamie's two. However, even with the first free move, Jamie was unable to stop Wolfgang from playing a tile which lengthened his own line by one and blocked Jamie, and Wolfgang won the game 23-20.

Move 14 was the crucial move of game 2, Wolfgang adding to his own line but ignoring the potential of a loop for Jamie when he already had the green straight tile that Jamie would force him into playing to make the necessary link across the top of the Tantrix. Jamie duly completed the loop to score 30. Although Wolfgang recovered well and extended his line to 25, a bit of good fortune with the tiles helping him to connect his two lines, it was not enough.

Game 3 saw both players end up with two roughly equal disconnected lines, but Jamie both played better and got what little luck was going in this game. His position always looked more soundly based and he connected his lines (even getting superficially close to a large loop) while Wolfgang did not manage to connect his. Jamie won 24-16 to leave him in the lead in the match by 36.5-23.5 TPs. The match concludes on Sunday 7 October at 07.00 GMT / 09.00 CET / 19.00 NZT.

After apparently going for three loops in three games at the start of his match against no. 16 seed Jacques-Olivier Haenni (SUI) (see above), no. 20 seed Martin Harlow (GBR) changed the script slightly by forcing his opponent into two 7-tile loops by move 20 in an ever-so-slightly-crazy game 4. Having wasted 14 of Jacques-Olivier's tiles, Martin looked on for a big win but had two disconnected lines which were both quite blocked most of the time and in the end, only just escaped with a 14-14 draw. He might well not got the draw had he not ended up with the first free move after the bag was empty.

That left the score very close, with Jacques-Olivier needing a draw and Martin a win in what looked like being a very nerve wracking final game. In fact, the tension dissipated quite early when Martin yet again went for a big loop and was at last successful. Martin built his 15-tile loop very quickly after Jacques-Olivier was a bit careless about the helpful links he was forcing in for Martin as he tried to build his own line. A little luck on move 15 more or less completed Martin's loop, though his position was very strong even without that. Martin tells me that he does not usually take such reckless risks as going for doubtful loops in NON-tournament games. He has obviously never heard the oft-mentioned advice about taking less risks in tournament games, unless you are up against a much stronger opponent. :-) In a spirited fightback, Jacques-Olivier did well to add another 12 tiles to his line before the end, given that all Martin had to worry about was trying to block him and wasting his tiles, but he was never going to make it to 30 and Martin won the game 30-26 and with it the match by 53.1-46.9 TPs, the closest match of Round 4 so far.


ROUND 4 DRAWS TO A CLOSE, ROUND 5 GETS UNDERWAY:

(6 Oct)

Tantrix inventor and no. 11 seed Mike McManaway (NZL) looked to be coasting to a win against no. 29 seed Steven Wiley (USA) when he won the first two games to take a 29.0-11.0 lead but a draw in game 3 and an 8-tile win in game 4 gave Steven the chance to qualify if he won game 5. It was not to be though - Mike won the final game 23-20 to win the match by 57.5-42.5 TPs. This means that only one North American player, José Luis Cortina (MEX), is left in the tournament.

Round 5 got underway today, with no. 14 seed Matt Peek (NZL) and unseeded giant-killer Garry Laishley (AUS) (who has had to win four matches to get this far) playing their first three games. The run of the tiles did not go Garry's way as it did in the first two games of his previous match, in which he ended up winning all five games against the European Champion. After losing games 1 and 3 and drawing game 2, Garry is very much up against it and he will have to win at least two of the three games in the final session to stand any chance of continuing his run.

Back in Round 4, Pacific Champion and no. 3 seed Britta Steude (NZL) survived her match against no. 31 seed László Harsanyi (HUN), but it was very close. Resuming at 20.0-20.0, Britta edged game 3 by a single tile to take the lead, László going over the time limit trying for a better result, but László won game 4 by 7 tiles to go ahead by 41.2-38.8 TPs. However, in the final game he could not manage the draw he needed, Britta winning 27-19 to take the match by 54.6-45.4 TPs.

Unseeded Leah Bell (AUS) started the second of three sessions 30.7-9.3 TPs up against no. 2 seed Steven Trezise (GBR) and only needed to win one of the last three games to virtually guarantee a big shock win. This was a more interesting game than the first two, so here is a bit of (very subjective!) analysis for those crazy people who tell me they enjoy things like this :-) ...

The game took a very early twist as Leah made a mistake when her second tile (move 3) created a forced space for which Steven had two tiles - one would have connected her tiles in a line, but she must not have noticed that playing the other would allow Steven to force her to waste five of her tiles in a small loop. As it was, Leah picked up another tile which fitted that forced space and cut the number of wasted tiles to four.

In the early part of the game, both Steven's form (which could hardly have got worse) and run of tiles were better than a week before and when he created a risky forced space (move 9) to try to save an isolated corner tile and picked up the best tile for that space immediately, it looked like the tiles had swung his way and the beginnings of a comeback might be on the cards.

Leah immediately countered (moves 11-12) by creating an even more risky controlled side which was very unlikely to complete but would have added quite a few tiles to her line if it did. It also left Steven with few options to extend his line without leaving himself blocked at the wrong end of a controlled side. After a lot of thought, he blocked one end of each player's line (move 13) in a forced space which was a lookalike for a tile that would have allowed Leah to link her lines. That tile came out of the bag soon after and Steven was glad to be able to play it (move 21) in the lookalike space.

Leah's lines were disconnected as the controlled side was filled but with her next free move (move 26), she kept up the pressure by taking her lines very close to connection again and cleverly creating forced spaces guaranteed to waste a number of Steven's tiles away from his main line.

We are now at the crucial stage of the game. Steven had the next 14 moves in a row. Usually that is an advantage because it gives the player with the moves more choices, but in this case everything went wrong. Steven had to turn Leah's two main lines away from each other. First of all, he filled the forced spaces away from the danger area to see if the tiles drawn gave him any better options. Then, 15-9 ahead, he played move 36, which turned Leah's right-hand line completely away from the left-hand line over towards a single separated red corner. However, someone trying to script a Tantrix nightmare could not have picked a more agonising sequence of tile draws than that which followed and by the end of the forced moves, Leah just had to fill in a corner to end up adding 9 to her line to take a 18-15 lead.

Calm enough not to just snatch at the chance of completing the line, Leah played a tile (move 43) which forced in the corner she needed and wasted two more of Steven's tiles at the same time. That helped to ensure her win because it stopped Steven from reaching more than 18. Leah added another tile to her line (move 50) for a 19-18 win and an almost unbeatable 44.0-16.0 TPs lead in the match with two games to go. The match is due to conclude on Sunday at 10.00 GMT / 11.00 BST / 20.00 AEST.

Move 36 is a good Tantrix 'problem' to solve, so you might like to have a look at the game (Bell-steven2-2001-10-07-1159) and see what you would have played, either taking your time or imagining you had 3-4 minutes left on your clock too - great practice for when a similar dilemma (or 7-lemma!) comes up in one of your own matches.

Could a safer move have been played at move 36, or was the die cast as the forced tiles were being played even before that free move? Move 36 has been the subject of much analysis by last year's World Champion and a couple of other strong players and while there are moves that might have been better in hindsight (e.g. those which turned the left-hand line away), without knowing the sequence of tile draws, they all held a lot more danger of allowing the two main lines to be linked, giving Leah an even bigger score. It seems so far that the move Steven actually played gave Leah the lowest expected score, assuming all tile sequences were equally likely (though that does not mean we analysed ever single possible tile run!), and would have ensured a win for him in most situations, but maybe you can prove us wrong! :-)

(7 Oct)

Thanks to European Champion Ben Polman (NED) for the following analysis in reply to the last paragraph of yesterday's report ... "if Steven had played the RBYRYB at the bottom left corner, forcing in the BBYRYR to the right of it, that would have created a forced space (YBR) which could not be filled any more, because the BBYRYR was the only tile left that would have filled it. At the bottom, Leah could have played her YBBRYR but until the bag was empty she could not have connected, giving Steven time to do something, either extending his line or wasting the necessary RBR's to connect Leah's two lines." In some ways, this looks even more dangerous of course and would only be worth playing had the probability of what actually happened seemed higher than it actually did, but it would have worked better the way the tiles actually came out.

Now onto today's matches. Today saw a record number (by a long way) of WTC and Plate matches in a single day, with over 20 people in the lobby at times, lots of people spectating the matches, results coming in continuously, some fascinating games and yet more shocks. More games than ever that areworthy of a report too, so I've tried to do the day justice ...

A trans-Tasman Round 5 match started us off, with no. 14 seed Matt Peek (NZL) resuming 40.8-19.2 TPs of unseeded Garry Laishley (AUS). Garry won game 4 by 19-17 to close the gap, but a 19-19 draw in game 5 Garry needing a massive win in game 6. Matt won that to take the match by 71.6-48.4 TPs.

The match between 1999 runner-up and no. 12 seed Jamie Sneddon (NZL) and no. 21 seed Wolfgang Schwarz (GER) always had the potential to be a classic and the finish today was as exciting as they come, even if with so much at stake, neither player was at their absolute best.

Jamie was 36.5-23.5 TPs ahead after the first session. In game 4, both players battled to make long lines, with Jamie having a clear edge early on. After 31 moves though, Jamie was only leading by 17-16 and Wolfgang only a forced tile away from reaching 21. Jamie's next free moves, playing across the top right-hand corner, increased his line by 8 to, but the forced tile Wolfgang needed came out in that sequence too so it was 25-22 with Wolfgang to move. Anything Jamie could do, Wolfgang could do too, it seemed - he in turn played at the new top right-hand corner to increase his line by 8 and won the game by 31-27 to cut the deficit to 41.8-38.2 to Jamie.

Wolfgang started the final game very well and by move 11 had a line of 8 tiles curving back into itself and threatening a loop. Jamie cut that off by creating a 4-tile loop of Wolfgang's colour in between the two ends of his line, but Wolfgang countered by increasing his line to 12 and threatening an even bigger loop but when Jamie blocked both ends of Wolfgang's line along a controlled side with move 22 it looked like Wolfgang might end up paying for his boldness. This was a questionable move though, with three tiles left for the crucial forced space, all of which would connect Wolfgang's line to the tile Jamie had just laid. Maybe the move was the only way to remove the danger of a big loop though.

Wolfgang continued to add to his potential line and the growth of Jamie's line accelerated too. In the end, Wolfgang found the best connections and won the game 24-19 and with it the match by 53.5-46.5 TPs, sending yet another top 16 seed out of the tournament. In the last 16, Wolfgang will play another conqueror of a top 16 seed from New Zealand, no. 24 seed José Luis Cortina (MEX), the only North American player left in the tournament.

Unseeded Leah Sanders (AUS) finished off a fine victory over no. 2 seed and 1998 World Champion Steven Trezise (GBR), amazingly the fourth of the top five seeds to fall at the first hurdle this year. Steven needed two big wins and took some reckless risks in game 4, creating two potential loops.

When Steven played forced move 37, which looked like it was going to be the last move before his free move, he still had a very outside chance. While Leah was playing, he had worked out a move (wonder why I know this ... this writng in the third person can be so silly sometimes!) which would get him very close to a loop if it managed to force in one of the eight tiles left in the bag and create forced spaces to give him more chance of getting the tile he wanted, as well as potentially allowing him to link his lines at the top in the endgame because the tile which would have blocked the crucial space would then no longer be available.

The loop was still a long shot but when, before he could play his free move, he then picked up the tile he had wanted to force (a 1 in 8 chance, possibly less since another roced tile could have come out first instead) and had to play it in a forced space which resulted in the triple whammy of keeping his lines at the top apart, stopping him from carrying out his plan or the best alternative and allowing Leah to increase her line by 5 tiles, he knew the nightmare had still not ended - the game was well and truly up and Leah won by a large margin, 28-17,to seal her victory in style.

Steven gained a consolation 15-12 win a messy final game after managing to waste many of the tiles that would have helped Leah to win when both players were blocked for a long time. Leah made the mistake of not realising that a forced space she was ccreating culd only be filled once the restriction rules were lifted with a tile which was already in Steven's hand and which he wasted straightaway.

Just a small oversight at the end of a match in which Leah built her lines like a champion, blocked at all the right times and took full advantage of every chance that came her way to record a huge 66.1-33.9 win over the no. 2 seed, possibly the biggest shock since Bevan Chong (NZL) (another first match casualty this year but at that time unseeded) beat the then no. 1 seed, Tantrix inventor Mike McManaway (NZL), in the last 16 in 1999.

Unseeded Brett Randall (AUS) caused yet another shock when he beat top-rated compatriot and no. 7 seed Andrew Swan (AUS) by 62.0-38.0 TPs. The match was very close early on, with one win each and a draw in the first three games, but Brett won the last two games to record a clear victory.

This means that all three unseeded Australians have beaten top 16 players to qualify for the last 16 - an amazing achievement. Where on earth were Brett, Leah and Garry when the Australian and Pacific Championships were in progress? :-)

Australian Champion and no. 15 seed Matt Mayoh (AUS) and no. 32 seed Ragnar Wikman (FIN) played their whole match today, and what an enthralling match it was! The first game hinged on a single forced space. Matt was heading towards a large loop early on, but trying to connect around the top right-hand corner of the Tantrix, did not realise that four of the tiles which would have fitted the forced space he created on move 17 were already out of the bag and the other two could not fill the space because they would have created a space surrounded by three reds. Not really surprising that he did not think he needed to count that early in the game.

Ragnar had one of these two restricted, potentially forced tiles already in his hand and Matt picked up the other one just four moves later. If Matt could somehow hold onto that tile for another 21 moves until all the tiles were out of the bag and the restrictions were lifted, he would be able to play it and block Ragnar's line at the same time ... and by some miracle that is what happened. Ragnar, ahead in the game overall, appeared not to realise the situation even as the bag emptied, and did not force it by chance either. As a result, Matt won a game that Ragnar could have closed out countless times by 24-19.

From an aesthetic point of view, game 2 was notable for the way Ragnar seemed to be getting very close to a loop in the shape of a perfect six-pointed star, but Matt sacrificed art for the sake of practicality :-) and did not allow it to be completed. Ragnar kept his nose just in front throughout the game and when both ends of both players' lines became blocked with five tiles left in the bag, he was 18-16 ahead. A forced tile Ragnar was waiting for added three more to his line and he won the game 21-16, to leave the match level at 20.0-20.0 TPs.

In game 3, both players were blocked on controlled sides at both ends by move 17, with Matt 11-8 ahead. When one of those sides was filled, it was 14-13 to Matt. The tiles were with Matt as he picked up a tile which fitted both of blocked spaces in Ragnar's line and was able to waste it elsewhere and then immediately picked up a tile which freed the other end of his own line. Ragnar's line did then become unblocked, but one last connection in Ragnar's line did not quite complete and it was 22-17 to Matt as the last tile came out of the bag. Both players managed to add four more to their lines to make the final score 26-21 to Matt.

Game 4 was very close too, with both players having to contend with disconnected lines and blockages before Ragnar finally came through 19-16, to leave Matt leading by just 40.7-39.3 with one game to go.

A nervy start to game 5 saw Matt forced into a loop of four tiles and Ragnar with two badly disconnected lines early on, one of which Matt forced into a 5-tile loop. Ragnar came into the middle game ahead and with many of Matt's tiles wasted, he always looked like winning unless Matt could complete a potential (but unlikely) loop at the top of the Tantrix. In the end, he won 19-16 to win a great match by 53.6-46.4 TPs and knock out yet another of the top 16 seeds.

So, all the unseeded Australians got through, but the two top-rated Australians went out, summing up this year's Championship perfectly! Ragnar will play one of those unseeded Australians, Leah Sanders (AUS) next.

A second Round 5 match got underway today, no. 10 seed Yoseph Phillips (NZL) playing against no. 28 seed Heli Niemi (FIN). Heli was a little reckless at the start of the first game, giving Yoseph a chance to turn her into a loop of 8 tiles if he picked up the right tile, but Heli quite rightly felt very unlucky when Yoseph picked up the tile he needed immediately - a 1 in 40 chance. By move 21, Yoseph already had the lead with a line of 17 and apart from her loop, Heli had just three single isolated tiles with her colour on the Tantrix. After that, there was no way back for Heli, though after that nightmare start, she did exceptionally well to create a line of 22 at the bottom of the Tantrix by the end and to limit Yoseph to 26.

Heli managed to quickly build a good line at the start of game 2 and after getting a very good run of forced tiles from moves 20-26 to make up for her bad luck in game 1, she was 16-8 ahead. Yoseph had a lot of dangerous indirect links along one side of the Tantrix which would have potentially added 10 to his line had they all been connected, so Heli took a calculated risk at move 27 (I assume it was calculated anyway!) by blocking the side with a forced space which only one remaining tile could fill without creating a forced space with three blues and blocking Yospeh completely in the endgame.

Yoseph made his potential line longer and longer but on move 34 Heli had created a lookalike for the last tile that could fit the crucial forced space before the endgame and the tile eventually came out to her. Probably shocked at what had happened and unable to stretch his longest line to more than 10, Yoseph lost 25-10 and Heli took the lead in the match.

In game three, it was Yoseph's turn to take a big risk as he effectively forced Heli into a loop scoring 20 as early as move 6 and spent the rest of the game trying to catch up, with Heli doing all she could to waste his tiles and to block him. Although Yoseph (perhaps unintentionally) got close to a couple of potentially winning loops, they were never really on and Heli's attacks on his line were successful to give her the game by 20-15, and admitted after the game that he made a mistake on move 19, playing a tile which he thought led to his lines being connected but which actually turned them away from each other.

Heli won game 4 too, by 22-18, with Yoseph dropping a time penalty. Heli nearly threw away game 5 but got very lucky indeed. 9-8 behind and trying to link her main line to two isolated tiles, she played a tile on the left of the Tantrix at move 18 and filled a forced space which gave her an indirect line of 14. However, this left her needing two GRG tiles in order to complete the indirect links with only two left, one in her own hand which she played.

Yoseph had noticed exactly what was going on and played a clever move 23 which meant that the tile Heli needed would not fit until the restriction rules were lifted after move 42. Unable to find a place where he could create a GRG lookalike, Yoseph nevertheless created a different lookalike for the crucial tile, but another tile which fitted that lookalike space came out straightaway and in the end Helly did complete her line to win 24-19 and seal the match within the distance.

A consolation 22-12 win for Yoseph in game 6 made the final score look a little more respectable at 72.0-48.0 TPs, but Heli (who first showed potential when she was the highest place tournament debutant in the 1999 European Championship) had reached her first World Championship quarter-final, knocking out two of the top 16 seeds on the way. Coupled with Ragnar's win, there seems to be no stopping the flying Finns, with Finland the third best represented country in the last 16.

No. 9 seed Phil Sneddon (NZL) resumed 40.0-20.0 up against no. 18 seed Kevin Scott (GBR) but was soon in trouble in game 4. A seemingly routine move 14, looping one of Kevin's tiles started a second line for himself too and while Kevin's single main line grew, Phil's two lines both seemed to grow, but each at half the rate of Kevin's line, without ever getting close to connecting. Kevin won 24-14 to leave himself needing a win by just two tiles to complete a recovery which had seemed unlikely before the session started.

It was not to be though. Maybe more nervous now the match was within his grasp again, Kevin played inaccurately at the start of game 5 and created problems which were to dog him for the rest of the game. Kevin's move 5 was the start of his troubles, allowing Phil to add four tiles to his line, taking into account indirect links. Kevin's next move, move 9, added to his problems, allowing Phil to come over the top and, with the help of a favourable tile draw, to effectively take his line up to 13 and start to threaten a big loop. We think turning the blue line down with a blue corner would have worked better for Kevin.

They say things always come in threes and Kevin's next free move, move 16, was the most dubious of the lot. Two of his tiles were threatened with being turned into a loop of four. Had he played the GRRGBB tile on the top right-hand corner of the Tantrix, then barring very unlucky tile draws he would have forced two of Phil's tiles in at the top connecting Kevin's two isolated tiles to his main line and effectively increasing his line length by five. Kevin tried this but gave up on the idea. Alternatively, Kevin could have dealt with Phil's threat of getting very close to a loop on the left, but he ignored that too and instead played to block one missing corner at the bottom right of Phil's line, turning his own line in what looked like the less advantageous direction into the bargain.

There were only two tiles left to fill the forced space needed for Phil's line, so maybe Kevin was going to try to force those two tiles into other places (in the end, he did not waste either of them, even though the first did not appear until 20 moves later), but it seemed a strange thing to do at that stage of the game with so much else threatened and with better ways to stop the loop being available.

Phil gratefully forced the 4-tile loop on Kevin and wasted a few more of Kevin's tiles on the side Kevin had just turned his line away from. From then on, Kevin's only hope was that Phil would remain blocked for a very long time and he did play better, stretching out his own line and definitely putting nagging doubts in Phil's mind. For a long time, Phil's loop got closer and closer to completing, or to at least being turned towards where Phil had been placing more of his own tiles to give him a longer line if the left end of his line got turned away from the loop, but it also seemed possible that he might get blocked.

Kevin made his fourth and most fatal mistake after playing a forced tile on move 33. Two tiles were left fitting the crucial forced space between the ends of Phil's line which had resulted. The YRBYBR would give Phil an 18-tile loop, the other (RBYYBR, which Phil had picked up at the end of his previous turn and had been unable to play at the time) would have let Kevin off the hook and probably given him the match. Kevin had to make a lookalike space for the YRBYBR tile, which he could have done (but did not try to do) by creating a RYR at the top left-hand corner of the Tantrix and try to make sure that the tile came out to him. Alternatively, he had to hope that Phil would have to play the tile before the fateful tile came out, but with so many forced spaces for which there were still tiles in the bag, that was too big a risk. Kevin played at the right place, but with the wrong tile, and ended up having to play all of the remaining tiles in the bag in forced spaces, including the crucial YRBYBR which gave Phil his loop and a 36-22 win.

Phil won the match by 60.8-39.2 TPs and will play giantkiller Brett Randall (AUS) in a trans-Tasman clash in the last 16.

(8 Oct)

Round 4 has been the craziest round I can ever remember in the WTC, with six of the top eight seeds losing. It could be the strongest Plate competition there will ever be! After a UK winner in 1998, an Australian in 1999 and another UK winner in 2000, it is certainly beginning to look the northern and southern hemispheres are taking turns at winning the WTC and that there is a good chance of the pendulum swinging back to the southern hemisphere this year. And who would have thought before the competition started that Finland would be the third best represented country in the last 16?

Round 5 continued apace today, with no. 21 seed Wolfgang Schwarz (GER) taking a big lead against no. 24 seed José Luis Cortina (MEX) after three hard-fought games. The first game was drawn 23-23 but Wolfgang won the next two 21-16 and 21-13 respectively - the latter a very strong performance indeed by the winner who ruthlessly cut off all of José's chances one by one.

This week's feature match involved no. 20 seed Martin Harlow (GBR), who had tried for large loops in the first three games of his Round 4 match. The boot was on the other foot tonight as no. 3 seed Britta Steude (NZL) tried for large loops in the first three games of their Round 5 match. Six spectators in the lobby and at least three more people watching the match on those people's screens were treated to an absolutely enthralling first session, full of excitement and of difficult dilemmas for both players, at the end of which they were separated by just a tiny margin.

One very clear difference between the players in this match can be seen in the way they build their lines. Britta lengthens her lines as much as possible by creating indirect links, especially in the early part of the game when it is better on balance to do this (but still a bit risky to leave quite as many links to be filled in as she does) and she is probably the best exponent of this approach in the world. On the other hand, Martin appears to prefer the safety of direct links, or at least those already connected by forced spaces, as long as this does not limit the growth of his line too much. The games were prime examples of this contrast in styles, with each approach coming out on top in one game and honours almost even in the third.

Some frighteningly good line-building by Britta at the start of game 1 saw her closing in on a loop of 11 tiles (or more) very early on, although it could be said that Britta's move 11 was not the best. She tried to ensure that her lines did not get disconnected on the left-hand side of the Tantrix (when if Martin had turned her lines apart at one end, she would clearly have been able to connect them at the other end) and failed to close off Martin's loose tile at the top.

Martin played a good (if reasonably obvious) move 13, adding four to his line by connecting to the loose tile referred to above and blocking both ends of Britta's line on a short controlled side. Then, unable to do much on the right-hand side of the Tantrix, she wasted a few of Martin's links at the bottom of the Tantrix with move 15, but in doing so made what turned out to be the fatal miscalculation of not filling the corner link missing in her own line on the left-hand side.

That gap was never filled in the end, mainly because Martin played a brilliant move 17, which indirectly lengthened his own line and took it away from the blocked area but, far more importantly, created a controlled side on the left for which only one tile was left in the bag which would fit before the endgame, with two more tiles left which could be played there only after the restriction rules were lifted at which point they would block Britta's line completely. Did Martin see all of these implications as well as the boost to his own line? Maybe not, since it was a bit risky too (with his own line also being limited if the crucial forced space was not filled) but we'll never know!

Halfway through the game, the right-hand ends of Britta's lines were turned away from each other when the forced spaces there were filled, but at least her line was freed up again on that side. After move 29, she had a YYRGRG tile which was forced in two different spaces, and admitted at the end of the game that she had chosen the wrong space to fill. When the YGRYRG tile which also fitted the other forced space came out to Martin on his next turn, he was able to connect his main line to all the tiles Britta had been trying to waste. There had been a 1 in 2 chance of that tile being the first of those which would have fitted that space to come out of the bag, but Britta was unlucky that it came out to Martin quite so quickly.

Another thing which suggests that Martin did not realise the full significance of move 17 is that he made no apparent attempt to waste the last tile which would have allowed Britta to fill the last link in the left-hand side of her line. In that case, he was absurdly lucky that it was the very last tile out of the bag and that he had the other tile which filled the space in his hand at the time, which could only be placed at that exact point after the restriction rules were lifted and would block the space Britta needed to fill. He would have won without this, but this helped the margin to be a huge 15 tiles as he won 29-14.

Game 2 started off in a very similar way to game 1, with Britta terrifyingly efficient at the start, getting very close to a loop of 16 tiles. By move 20, all that was missing were two BRB tiles for forced spaces at the top of the Tantrix (four BRBs left in the bag) and a blue corner missing at the bottom.

Martin did all he really could do, creating a controlled side at the bottom of the Tantrix with move 21, though this also blocked a missing corner link halfway along his own line. There were two tiles left in the bag that would have connected his line and forced in a tile to fill Britta's missing bottom link and one that could only be played after the restriction rules were lifted that would have connected his line and blocked Britta's link.

Now all Britta could do was to try to create as many forced spaces as possible on her moves to give her as much chance as possible of drawing the crucial tiles herself, and try to waste Martin's tiles. All Martin could do was to try to create lookalikes for the forced spaces Britta needed to be filled and try to draw as many tiles as possible himself to give him all of the options.

It has to be said that Britta played her part in this far more determinedly than Martin played his (e.g. why did Martin at least not try creating a BRB forced space at the bottom right on move 29?) and Britta had no trouble filling the first BRB space at move 35, choosing the right-hand space to fill because filling the left-hand space would have meant one of the three tiles left in the bag for the other space would have fallen foul of the restriction rules.

Near the end, Martin seemed to throw in the towel in two ways, seeming to give up on any attempt to stop Britta's loop and just concentrating on adding tiles to his own line, maybe because he was running short of time. It may not have changed the final result in the end, but losing to a loop scoring 32 was going to be so bad anyway that it was probably worth taking any chance to try to stop it even at the risk of leaving his own line a bit shorter if the loop did complete.

Firstly, playing his YRYRBB tile on move 36 in the place where he actually played a different tile would have given Martin an outside chance of wasting both of the tiles which fitted the forced space at the bottom so that Britta would have to play the tile which blocked herself in that space on her next turn. There may have been even better ways for Martin to achieve this by forcing extra tiles too, giving himself more chance of drawing the tiles he needed.

Secondly, Martin filled the last BRB gap in Britta's line on move 41 when he could have wasted the tile elsewhere, thinking this was where it would help his own line most (though it blocked it in the end) and assuming Britta's loop was going to be completed anyway. It probably was going to be completed, but with Tantrix it is always best to give yourself any chance you can of avoiding things like that unless you have analysed the position 100% and found it hopeless ... after all, strange, unexpected things can and do happen in complex positions. With Britta's loop completed, she won the game 32-16 to edge ahead in the match by just 0.2 TPs.

Game 3 was a classic encounter. Once again, Britta started off line-building for all she was worth and got close to a loop. With two corner links missing on the left-hand side, Britta did not want to get caught out or made to sweat again, so with move 15, she forced Martin to add one of the corner links and must have been feeling lucky when he picked up a tile which filled the other gap on that side straightaway. She could still do little with the two ends of her line on the right though until a RYR forced space got filled - there were four tiles left in the bag which would fit it.

A very strange move 19 by Martin, probably a miscalculation, left him with a couple of short lines disconnected from his main line. Britta made sure that she disconnected them completely, though she left an outside chance of an 11-tile loop for Martin in doing so. She then picked up a tile which would have filled the forced space on the right and freed up the ends of her line, but made the mistake which probably cost her the game of being a bit greedy and filling a different forced space with it, hoping a tile with some blue on it would come out later to fill the space on the right and make a loop an even bigger possibility.

Filling the 'wrong' forced space at move 26 also created a forced space which Martin was able to fill with yet another of the tiles which could have fitted in the forced space on the right, and now Britta was in real danger. On move 33, she was able to fill the space with a tile with some blue on it as she had originally hoped, but by this time there was not enough time to force completion of the loop before the endgame and, with few tiles left in the bag, plenty of scope for Martin to block it, which he did.

After move 45, it was 17-16 to Britta and, after such a complex game, both players were in desperate time trouble. Martin could add one tile to his line on his next free move to make it 17-17 but could not add two immediately so in order to win, he had to try to make a move which would not allow Britta to stop him from adding one more tile on his next move. He played what looked like a good move, but Britta (dropping a worthwhile time penalty in the process) found the move that stopped him from adding to his score, using the top tile of the two Martin had just added in order to play the last tile with RY on it and also force in a tile which put a red link next to the yellow link at the end of Martin's line. A 17-17 draw and the online equivalent of a standing ovation for both players from the assembled spectators, who included some of the best players in the world.

Despite the 17-17 score, the time penalty was enough to give Martin an unexpected (by him as much as anyone else!) 30.9-29.1 TPs lead in the match and the feeling that he might, just might, now have the chance to get past the no. 3 seed. The match is due to continue on Tuesday 16 October at 21.00 GMT / 22.00 BST / 10.00 (Wed. 17) NZT, so book your seat at a PC with a connection to the lobby now! :-)

(9 Oct)

No. 21 seed Wolfgang Schwarz (GER) finished off a huge 71.0-29.0 TPs victory over no. 24 seed José Luis Cortina (MEX) within the distance today, winning game 4 by 19-15 and game 5 by 21-14 to make it four wins in a row, game 1 having been drawn.

No. 28 seed Heli Niemi (FIN) now has the now daunting prospect of facing Wolfgang in the quarter-finals, though she is also in good form. As a result, there is guaranteed to be at least one European in the semi-finals once again this year.

No. 6 seed Shaun Cooper (NZL), leading unseeded Ilona Halbach (GER) by 36.8-23.2 TPs after three games, went through to Round 5 when Ilona was defaulted by the controller of her section, Jamie Sneddon. He was given no alternative when she failed to communicate with her opponent for an extended period stretching well past the deadline.

Shaun will duel with the no. 11 seed, Tantrix inventor Mike McManaway (NZL) in the only single country match in the last 16.

This means that while the 13 unseeded New Zealanders had a bad time, all going out in the first three rounds, the more experienced New Zealanders seem to be on form with five of the seven seeded in the top 16 making it through to the last 16, one going out very unluckily and another losing to a very strong opponent.

The home of Tantrix, New Zealand has the most players in the last 16 with five (three from Auckland plus the two pros from Nelson), Australia comes next with three (all unseeded and the only unseeded players now left in the tournament, from QLD, VIC and SA), followed by surprise top European nation Finland with two. One player reached the last 16 from each of France, Germany, Hungary, Israel, Mexico and the UK, the latter keeping up Croydon's record of always having a player in the last 16, a record shared with three other towns/cities, which are (correct me if I'm wrong please, someone!) Auckland, Nelson and Budapest.


ROUND 4 NOW COMPLETE, ROUND 5 (last 16) CONTINUES:

(10 Oct)

The first game in the long-awaited match between experienced European heavyweights Péter Petrecz (HUN), the no. 13 seed, and no. 17 seed Jérôme Papillon (FRA), who knocked out the reigning champion in his last match, was one of the strangest games of Tantrix ever seen. At the end of a very blocked game, the tall thin Tantrix measured no less than 17 tiles from top to bottom - and looked a bit like a baby with a rattle in its hand ... and a strange long radio mast growing out of its head!

The start of the match was a taste of things to come, when there was only one tile left in the bag which could fill the first really crucial forced space (a GYG) as early as move 14, and even that tile was prevented from filling the space until the endgame by the restriction rules. The players did what they could to build lines at the bottom of the Tantrix with potential to be linked to their main lines, but could not really get anywhere near them for virtually the whole game. The score stayed at 9-7 to Péter for ten moves, and soon afterwards stayed at 10-8 to him for another 14 moves. When the endgame finally came around and the controlled side restriction was lifted, neither player could add more than two tiles to their lines, so Péter retained his lead to win 12-10.

Game 2 started badly for both players, with Jérôme having no option but to play a tile which could be looped on move 1, but then turning Péter into a 5-tile loop himself. Early on, there looked to be a potential loop for the Frenchman, but he got himself blocked near two forced spaces which could not be filled until the endgame, at which point they blocked him completely, and Péter won 19-9. Is Jérôme's revival (see earlier report) going to come to a very quick end?

No. 6 seed and NZ champion Shaun Cooper (NZL) has the upper hand against no. 11 seed Mike McManaway (NZL) by 27.2-12.8 TPs after two close games in the first session which Shaun won 22-20 and 18-17.

More on those two games from Mike himself:

"The first game is worth a look (M!scoop-mikem-2001-10-11-2209) as I blew a wonderful opportunity. With 11 tiles left in the bag, Shaun was well ahead but his line was only indirectly connected right in the middle. So, when a lengthy search turned up an obscure way to permanently block it, I was over the moon. An almost certain win to me, and probably a decent margin ...

... then I went and played the bl!*d$ tiles in the wrong order. Specifically on move 33, I needed to play my GBB tile (which was the last GBB tile) at bottom left, thus forcing the blue straight (which is what I did play), and setting up the last RGR tile to be forced next to it thus creating a permanent GBB block."

[It may be forbidden to feel sympathy for the inventor ;-) ... but reading that, I almost do - it's a horrible feeling when that happens]

"The second game was close, just one point in it. The type of normal flowing game that I like, no risky moves, no lengthy blockages. Could have gone either way."

(14 Oct)

After a three-day break, Round 5 picked up again today. 2000 New Zealand Champion and no. 9 seed Phil Sneddon (NZL) took a commanding 45.3-14.7 TPs lead over unseeded Brett Randall (AUS) by winning all three games in the first session of their match 22-19, 19-15 and 18-12, a combination of intuitive play and some good tiles. This match will finish on Wednesday at 08.00 GMT / 18.00 AEST / 21.00 NZT. After the demise of Garry Laishley (AUS) in the other trans-Tasman last 16 match, it was beginning to look like the unseeded Australians' luck was running out ...

... however, full of confidence after her win over the no. 2 seed in the previous round, Leah Sanders (AUS) apparently had no intention of letting no. 32 seed Ragnar Wikman (FIN) stop her from becoming the first unseeded player to reach the quarter-finals since Bevan Chong (NZL) two years ago (and Leah has had to win a lot more matches to get there - no less than five, including one default) and the first Australian to reach the quarter-finals since Zenon Kowalczyk (AUS), also in 1999, who went on to win the title.

A big 37-20 win for Ragnar in game 1 put early pressure on Leah, but she replied in awesome style, winning the next four games 25-18, 21-13, 19-17 and 23-20 to wrap up the match before a 17-17 draw in the last game. The final score, after 2 h 21 m of play in easily the longest match of the tournament so far, was 71.0-49.0 TPs to Leah - who would now believe she had a lobby ranking of under 800 before the start of the tournament? She will face a very tough trans-Tasman match in the last 8, but I expect her opponent will approach that match with a lot more trepidation than she will!

Finnish no. 1 Heli Niemi (FIN), was watching the Finnish no. 2 in game 5 and points out that Ragnar could have won it if, instead of using one of his tiles to force himself to add one to his line, he had forced Leah's last tile into the same space instead. The she would not have been able to use that tile to force one of Ragnar's to add two to her line and he would have been free to add his two remaining tiles to his own line. Strange that he missed this when it was Leah who was in time trouble rather than him - he would then have had to win the last game by only two tiles to reach the quarter-finals.

Trailing 12.8-27.2 after narrowly losing both games in the first session, no. 11 seed Mike McManaway (NZL) won the first game of the second session 30-17 against no. 6 seed Shaun Cooper (NZL) to almost draw level in the match and then won the next 22-19 to win the session by 32.1-8.9 TPs and forge ahead in the match by 44.9-35.1 TPs with two games left.

Mike reports: "I had a lucky loop in game 3, but Scoop played badly and could probably have easily stopped it. In fact, he did such a strange move 30 that, as he never makes mistakes :-), I'm going to ask him to review that game." I think Shaun did make a mistake. Mike was threatening the loop which he did eventually complete, but there was an obvious way to try to prevent the loop which would have blocked Mike completely. There was only one tile left which would fill the forced space Mike needed at the top of Tantrix, RGYRYG. Shaun had to create a lookalike, which he could easikly do by playing a tile with a red corner on the bottom left-hand corner of the Tantrix. Maybe he meant to play it and then picked up the wrong tile by mistake, because he actually played the wrong tile in the right place, the crucial tile came out soon afterwards and Mike completed his loop on his next free move.

This match is scheduled to finish on Monday at 01.00 GMT / 14.00 NZT and it looks like being the longest match of the Championship so far, between two normally pretty quick players. Shaun even dropped a time penalty in game 4, the 12th time penalty dropped in the last two rounds - definitely a record, which proves how hard-fought the matches are this year.

(15 Oct)

No. 11 seed and Tantrix inventor Mike McManaway (NZL) and no. 6 seed and New Zealand Champion Shaun Cooper (NZL) each won a game by one tile, 22-21 to Shaun then 20-19 to Mike, giving Mike a 64.9-55.1 victory which had looked improbable when he lost both games in the first session five days ago. The match was indeed the longest of the Championship so far, at 2 h 33 m, and was clearly incredibly tight all the way through - each player won three games, three games were decided by just one tile, one by two and one by three, and in the end it was Mike's preventable loop in game 3 which effectively decided the match.

Mike will play new Australian star, unseeded Leah Sanders (AUS), in a trans-Tasman quarter-final, with a northern hemisphere v southern hemisphere semi-final assured now that all the quarter-final places in the bottom half of the draw have been filled. If Leah does well in this match, she is almost certain to be the new Australian no. 1 in the Elo ratings. Though he is bound to be disappointed by not reaching the quarter-finals, Shaun has made some progress this year, reaching the last 16 for the first time - in 1999 and 2000, he had been knocked out in the last 32.

Mike has equalled the record held by Laurent Berguin (FRA) and Steven Trezise (GBR) of three appearances out of four in the last eight of the World Championship, though no player has reached the quarter-finals of all three tournaments in the current knockout format. Coincidentally (or perhaps this is a reason why they are among the few players in the first World Championship who still play regularly), the first two have been Tantrix pros throughout and the third is now but was not when he won the Championship.

Steven has a 1st (though that was back in 1998), a 3rd (2000) and a QF (1999); Mike has two 4th places (1998 & 2000) plus whatever he achieves this year; Laurent has a 4th (1999), a 5th (1998) and a QF (2000) - Britta Steude (NZL), yet another pro, could become the fourth player to share the record - I'll move this paragraph down and update it if she makes it. I'll get back to you later about who is the top amateur and who would be top if we ignore 1998.

(16 Oct)

No. 13 seed Péter Petrecz (HUN) completed an unexpectedly big win over no. 17 seed and 1998 runner-up Jérôme Papillon (FRA) by 81.2-38.8 TPs in the battle between two of the most experienced European players. Jérôme never seems to play well against Péter in tournaments, but it took some very strong play from Péter and, according to him, a bit of "big luck" too, for him to record a win as big as this.

Péter had been 30.1-9.9 TPs up after the first session, and it looked like Jérôme might make a match of it when he won game 3 by 17-14. However, Péter then reeled off the final three games, 22-15, 18-16 and 26-17, the latter the fastest win ever by an adult in a tournament game at 2 m 48 s, a minute longer than Joseph Ruby's overall tournament record.

While he finished 6th in the 1999 event, when those knocked out in the last 16 and the last 8 played off for 5th-6th places, this is the first time Péter, or indeed any Hungarian player, has reached the quarter-finals in the main draw.

(17 Oct)

Leading by 45.3-14.7 TPs after winning all three games in the first session, no. 9 seed Phil Sneddon (NZL) completed his victory against unseeded Brett Randall (AUS) after just 20 more minutes of play today when Brett resigned the match after Phil won game 4 by 26-23 to take the match score to 59.6-20.4.

Phil now meets no. 13 seed Péter Petrecz (HUN) in what looks like a fascinating northern v southern hemisphere quarter-final. Péter is the only player in the world to have finished in the top three in four Tantrix tournaments (five players are just behind him on three) and he was the European Champion in 1999. Phil has reached the final of the New Zealand Championship for the last two years, winning the title in 2000.

(18 Oct)

After delays for holidays, ISP failure and time zone problems, the match between no. 3 seed Britta Steude (NZL) and no. 20 seed Martin Harlow (GBR) concluded in sensational style today. Martin held a slender 30.9-29.1 TPs after an eventful first session, and to the delight of the spectators today's games were just as exciting. Martin recovered from a big loss in game 4 (where Britta went for a big loop for the fourth game in a row and this time made it) to take games 5 and 6 and record a famous victory by 67.1-52.9 TPs.

Martin now tells the whole story [with my 'help' in brackets like this], nicely conveying the excitement of playing in a match as important and 'on the edge' as this one:

"There were big margins in games 4 and 5, just like the first two games of the previous session. [In fact, lots of risks were taken in this match and four of the six games were decided by margins big enough to score 17.0 TPs or more - no other match in this round had more than one such game!]

This time Britta got the first big win with an early (and rather fortunate, perhaps!) loop I tried to stop but just made bigger: 28-14. Rather worrying - realistically, it left me needing 2 wins.

Game 5 went better. I started well and kept my lead. A bit of good fortune at move 28 pretty much sealed it - 28-13 to me. So Britta needed a win in the final game, I needed a draw.

Game 6 lived up to the other games in terms of excitement. We both built two lines [not something the experts would usually recommend!], both blocked in the same general area. On move 31, it all came right - I was able to join my ends for an indirect length of 24, even if Britta connected, which looked pretty unlikely. She had about 21 at that point. Also, I had two unblocked ends, she had only one. I may have bounced up and down a little at this point :-)

Numerous forced spaces followed, and just to rub it in, I got the first free move after the tiles ran out, not that Britta could have done much anyway.

Arguably, Britta made an error at move 15. If she'd played a BYB on the right-hand side of the Tantrix, to rescue the end of her line that was in danger of getting buried, her gap would never have occurred. I promptly blocked it (sort of - it could have gone wrong!) and that end of her line only ever gained one more tile, right at the end. I dare say she had her reasons for move 15 at the time."

It looks to me like Britta did have a good reason for move 15. Martin did have a potential loop in the left half of the Tantrix and with move 15 Britta closed off a tile which could have been a vital connection in that loop. Uncharacteristically over-cautious it may have been, but in that position when she knew that a big loop would have finished her off for sure, it was understandable.

Martin will play no. 14 seed Matthew Peek (NZL) in the quarter-finals, starting on Tuesday 23 October at 20.30 GMT / 21.30 BST / 09.30 Wed. NZT. No doubt many of us will all be glued to our screens and hanging on to the edge of our seats once again!


THE QUARTER-FINALS:

Amazingly (and for the first time), none of the top eight seeds have reached the quarter-finals, a combination of first match nerves, tough draws, dodgy tiles, dozy play and lack of practice having done for all of them. All but two of the quarter-finalists have tournament Elo ratings above 1900 though, and the other two are very likely to join them after this tournament. The World Championship looks more wide open than ever, with the top seed left, Phil Sneddon (NZL) at no. 9, probably not sure whether to be supremely confident or absolutely terrified!

This is also the first time New Zealanders have not filled half of the quarter-final places (maybe it will be the first time one of them wins the tournament to make up for it?), so a record six countries are represented in the QFs - New Zealand and Australia fill half the places for the southern hemisphere with Finland, Germany, Hungary and the UK (all except the UK new to the QFs) filling the other four places for Europe and the Americas nowhere to be seen for the second year in a row.

Auckland, Nelson and Croydon are the most successful towns/cities in the World Championship - the only places to have had quarter-finalists every year. Auckland has had the most quarter-finalists in total.

I will not make predictions for the QF matches in order to avoid putting a hex on anybody, but here are full details of the matches from which you can draw your own conclusions - {seeding, Elo rating} on the outside and (age now, city, country ) after the name. By the way, the average age of the quarter-finalists this year is 30, two years older than last year.

{13 - 1919}	Péter Petrecz	(34, Budapest, HUN)		v		Phil Sneddon	(26, Auckland, NZL)	{09 - 1929}
{14 - 1917}	Matt Peek	(18, Auckland, NZL)		v		Martin Harlow	(34, Croydon, GBR)	{20 -u1932}
{21 -u1962}	Wolfgang Schwarz	(25, Berlin, GER)		v		Heli Niemi	(26, Kemi, FIN)	{28 - 1809}
{11 - 1921}	Mike McManaway	(40, Nelson, NZL)		v		Leah Sanders	(37, Flaxton, AUS)	{Unseeded}

(23 Oct)

No. 14 seed and 1999 semi-finalist Matt Peek (NZL) did no harm to his chances of reaching another semi-final as he played skilfully to take the first two games against no. 20 seed Martin Harlow (GBR), who played boldly but whose luck, along with his connection at times, deserted him in this session. Matt seems to be playing back near his best of two years ago, when he ended up finishing 3rd.

In game 1, both players were doing their best to connect two medium length lines of their one colour when Martin found what at first sight was a brilliant line-building play on move 29. However, he had not been counting the tiles and Matt had, and was able to block the connection (and one end of Martin's longest line) permanently and then block the other end at just the right time later on in the game. Martin had the first unrestricted free move 15-14 ahead and blocked one end of Matt's line but Matt played a straight at the other end to make it 15-15 and give Martin no way of stopping him adding another tile to win 16-15.

Matt won game 2, another close one by 21-19, but a very exciting finale to the session was to follow.

The most striking thing about game 3 was that five of the six BYYs were already out on the Tantrix as early as move 15. Matt noticed this and when Martin created an indirect link in the middle of his line which needed the last BYY, Matt was getting ready to create a lookalike and drastically cut Martin's line length. Martin got lucky this time when the BYY came out to him soon afterwards and he was able to play it where he needed it. However, Matt did soon create BYY at both ends of Martin's line to limit him to 18. If Matt had been lucky too, a very large loop could have been on for him but it was not to be.

With all the tiles out of the bag, it looked like Matt was heading for a one-tile win, but managed to play a tile which allowed Martin to stop him from adding another tile to his line, when there had been better alternatives which would have guaranteed him a win. As Matt said himself, "that really was moronic". So, game 3 ended up a 18-18 draw. Matt will take a 37.2-22.8 TPs lead into the final session, scheduled for Thursday 25 October at 20.30 GMT / 21.30 BST / 09.30 Friday NZT, but with such small margins of victory may well still need to win two of the remaining four games to make certain of qualifying.

Martin always seems to draw a crowd to his WTC matches these days and the two-year-old record for the most spectators in a game room was broken when 11 people packed in to watch the unfolding drama. There were many more people in the lobby than shown in the picture (only the bottom of the list can be seen) and you can see 10 spectators in the game room, but it is clear from the text above the game that when MarcAB entered he must have been the eleventh before he left again, because no one else joined after him so the ten still showing must have already been in the room when he entered. (24 Oct)

No. 21 seed Wolfgang Schwarz (GER) lost game 1 by 17-15 but recovered very strongly to win the next three games 22-19, 34-26 and 22-14 to lead no. 28 seed Heli Niemi (FIN) by 52.0-28.0 TPs after four games in the only all-European semi-final.

(25 Oct)

The QF between no. 9 seed Phil Sneddon (NZL) and no. 13 seed Péter Petrecz (HUN), both very experienced players, looked likely to be an even match but in the event the Péter ran away with the first session, winning all three games with sizeable margins, 32-24, 20-13 and 23-18 - a combination of Péter playing well and getting what luck there was and Phil having an off-day.

Phil sensibly called it a day after game 3 and the match will resume on Friday 26 October at 19.00 GMT / 21.00 CET / 08.00 Sat. NZT with Péter holding a big 46.3-13.7 TPs lead.

No. 14 seed Matt Peek (NZL) resumed against no. 20 seed Martin Harlow (GBR) with a 37.2-22.8 TPs lead and annihilated Martin in the second session by winning all four games to win the match by 100.4-39.6 TPs, six games to nil with one draw. This is the first time anyone has ever scored more than 100 TPs in a Tantrix match. This has not even been done in a semi-final or final before even though those matches are one or two games longer, though in a couple of cases it could have happened had the beaten players agreed to play all of the games in a match rather than resigning. Matt is also sitting on a nine-game unbeaten run, only three away from the 12-game unbeaten run set by Steven Trezise (GBR) at almost exactly the same stage of last year's World Championship, whose QF opponent did resign after losing the first five games.

Martin has done incredibly well to reach the quarter-finals of both the European and World Championships in his first year playing Tantrix, but this is one match he will hope to forget quickly. I will spare him the agony of going through all the games in detail, especially since they followed similar patterns. Unlike the first session, he was not particularly unlucky today, but suffered from having to take reckless risks to try to come from further and further behind in the match as the session wore on against a player who thrives on making his opponents pay for any risks they take.

Matt is clearly now the best in the world at making his own luck by creating blocks in the middle game, seemingly constantly aware of exactly which combinations including his opponent's colour have nearly all been played from very early in the game. Many times, he created identical forced spaces at both ends of Martin's line early in the game, having noticed that four of the six tiles available to fill those forced spaces were already out on the Tantrix, and then created further lookalike spaces with the same combination to make it almost certain that one or both ends of Martin's line would be permanently blocked.

Martin, under pressure, played into Matt's hands time and time again by giving him gold-plated blocking opportunities, including two truly dreadful moves in game 5, moves 23 and 29. After move 22, a crucial indirect link in the middle of Martin's line needed a RRB forced tile. There were only two left in the bag even at that early stage and with his previous free move, Matt had already created a lookalike for one of them. There was another RR indirect link missing near the bottom end of Martin's line and he really had to make sure that it could not become a RRB forced space too, by making it a RRanythingbutblue forced space. It looks like Martin wanted to stop Matt increasing his line around the top of the Tantrix by creating a long controlled side, but that was not the main threat in my opinion and he blocked the bottom end of his line at the same time, leaving himself completely at the mercy of the tile draws.

Martin almost got away with it though, when the forced tile needed to unblock the crucial indirect connection near the bottom of his line came out of the bag after move 28 ... but the tile also fitted another forced space at the top of the Tantrix and Martin played it there. I only had half an eye on the game and first thought Matt had been lucky enough to get the tile out and taken the obvious best choice, then was astounded when I saw that it was Martin who had played the tile there, leaving only one tile which would fit the forced space near the bottom of the Tantrix - one which would (and soon did) create another RRB forced space at Martin's indirect link and, as you would expect against Matt, neither of Martin's RRB spaces were filled in the end. This was by far the worst example of a theme which recurred throughout the match.

Matt has become the first person to reach the semi-finals of the World Tantrix Championship twice since the knockout format started in 1999, though Mike McManaway (NZL) could do the same if he wins his QF. Mike already has two top four finishes if 1998 is included too, and on that basis Steven Trezise (GBR) has had two top four finishes as well. Funnily enough, the only time Matt 'failed' in the WTC was when he was the no. 1 seed in 2000 - every year the no. 1 seed has found the pressure of expectation too much and has gone out in one of their first two matches. This year, though, Matt is beginning to play better than ever before and could easily do better than his 3rd place in 1999.

(26 Oct)

Tantrix inventor and no. 11 seed Mike McManaway (NZL), like Matt Peek (NZL) another player who only had a bad WTC when he was the no. 1 seed, started his QF today looking to reach the semi-finals for the second year in a row. He is playing the only unseeded survivor, Leah Sanders (AUS), who has already won through no less than five rounds and is trying to become the first unseeded player ever to reach the semi-finals.

All of the games in the first session were very tight, but Mike had the edge in games 1 and 3, with game 2 drawn, so he holds a daunting 39.3-20.7 TPs lead with four games left. Mike tells the story of the match so far in his own words:

"The first game Leah played very well, with the possible exception of trying to help her two lines to join up in the middle part of the game. However the end game went for me and I won by five tiles, 20-15.

The second game was a nightmare for both of us, and the resulting 16-16 draw a very fair result I thought.

The 3rd game was very blocked, very tight, and I think a small mistake by Leah in the end game allowed me to win by one tile, 15-14. However, Leah is playing very well and could easily come back at me in the remaining games."

The second session of this match is scheduled for Saturday 27 October at 06.00 GMT / 16.00 AEST / 19.00 NZT, and Leah will be looking to win at least one, preferably both, of those games to stay in contention, with the final session likely to be on Sunday.

No. 13 seed Péter Petrecz (HUN) started the final session against no. 9 seed Phil Sneddon (NZL) with a huge 46.3-13.7 TPs lead after winning the first three games yesterday. Phil had to close the gap quickly to avoid being overwhelmed and he started well with a 16-tile loop giving him a 32-15 win in game 4. He was unable to continue his comeback in game 5 though, Péter winning narrowly by 17-15. Phil won game 5 by 18-15 but, needing about a 30-tile win in game 6, he had to take too many risks and lost that game by 18-11. Phil had in fact shaded the second session, but Péter's big lead after Phil's off-day yesterday ensured that he won the match convincingly by 83.9-56.1 TPs.

So, it will be a first World Championship semi-final for Péter and for Hungary, where he will play Matthew Peek (NZL), seeded one place below him at 14, in what promises to be a great strategic northern hemisphere v southern hemisphere battle.

(27 Oct)

No. 28 seed Heli Niemi (FIN) staged a remarkable comeback today to become the lowest seed, the first Finn and only the second female player, to reach the World Championship semi-finals since it became a knockout competition. She ended the quest of no. 21 seed Wolfgang Schwarz (GER) to keep the trophy in the same family (if not the same country!) for a second successive year. The enthralled spectators definitely did not see the best play ever to grace a World Championship QF (perhaps not surprisingly given the tension of the match) but it was incredibly exciting stuff and nerve-wracking even for those who were only watching!

Unwell during the first session, Heli had won game 1 narrowly and then lost the next three heavily, leaving her the very daunting task of needing to win all three games by an average of more than three tiles today. Both players might have thought they were just going to play out the remaining games for the sake of it, but everything changed when Heli edged game 5 (a strange game where Wolfgang ended up forced into 5- and 6-tile loops Heli into a 7-tile loop) by a single tile, 17-16, and Wolfgang started finding that in contrast to Heli being ill in the first session, he was the player with a problem in this session, unable to see the tiles properly on the monitor he had borrowed.

I then watched the last two games. In order to win all three games by an average of more than three tiles in a situation where all Wolfgang had to do was to keep the margins down (and if in doing so he actually stole a win, the match would be all over), Heli ideally needed three things to happen - her line-building skills to be better than ever before, Wolfgang to play like a banana, and unprecedented luck with the tile draws. All three of these things happened - well, Wolfgang did not really play like a banana (I just put that in to make you smile, even if he does play yellow!) but he did take a couple of reckless risks in the games I saw and was certainly not in the kind of form in which he beat players like Jamie Sneddon (NZL) earlier in the tournament.

In fact, the last two games followed a similar pattern - at the start of each game, Heli raced into the lead with excellent line-building at the start and Wolfgang laid the foundations of his own downfall by blocking both ends of his line on the same controlled side. In each case, Wolfgang then started playing much better, blocking Heli's line time after time, but as if by magic Heli drew the tiles needed to unblock herself almost immediately every time, and got hold of all the tiles she needed to thwart Wolfgang's plans too.

Wolfgang probably lost game 6 with move 12, where he played for a 10-tile loop but blocked both ends of his line on a short controlled side in the process. Maybe he was alarmed at how quickly Heli's line was growing and thought he had to go for a loop, but able to make do with a small loss, most strong players would not have risked this. There were four tiles which would have filled the crucial forced space, one of which would have more or less assured completion of the 10-tile loop and a second which might have given him a slightly bigger loop had he had the next free move after it was drawn, but he was always likely to be at least delayed and to end up even more behind in the likely event that the loop did not complete.

Heli carried on adding tiles to her line and on move 18, Wolfgang tried to create some insurance for himself by setting up a line on the right which might connect to his other line if the first tile which came out for the crucial forced space turned the ends of his potential loop away from each other. However, Heli already had a tile in her hand to fill the forced space on move 20 which made this plan less likely to work, though it probably was the best he could do at the time and had luck been on Wolfgang's side today, a fortuitous tile draw would have made it much more likely to work. When Wolfgang played move 18, creating a YRY forced space at the top, there was only one tile left in the bag which could fill it, making this move risky even if the connection to his main line did end up working.

A neat move 21 by Heli added two to her line, and ensured that two of Wolfgang's short lines at the top of the Tantrix were less likely to join. Wolfgang's move 25 and forced move 26 created a lookalike for the crucial forced space at the bottom of the Tantrix, giving him options if an unfavourable tile was the first of the four to come out, if also giving Heli the chance of wasting the best forced tile for Wolfgang if she picked that tile up first.

Wolfgang was then unlucky enough to pick up both of the tiles which turned his line away from a loop in quick succession, and played the first at the bottom without waiting to see what would happen if he played in the lookalike space first, maybe thinking it better to ensure that his position was freed up at that stage rather than to continue hoping for the loop. To add insult to injury, having to play the other unfavourable forced tile at the top turned his line at the top away from his tiles on the right. To make matters even worse for him, with his line at the bottom at last getting close to his line on the right-hand side of the Tantrix, he picked up the tile he had originally needed to help complete his loop, but which now allowed Heli on her next free move to ensure that his lines at the bottom and on the right could not connect.

To increase the agony, Heli did have to fill the YRY forced space in Wolfgang's right-hand line for which there had only been one tile available for ages (see move 18 above), but this rare bit of luck came to him just after the previous sequence of moves had made it irrelevant, and when the last tile came out of the bag, Heli was 22-16 ahead, increasing the gap to 24-17 with her free move.

Wolfgang had to cut the margin to leave Heli needing more in the final game than just a single tile win and he did this well. When it was his turn to play again, he had five tiles left and Heli had two and he found a very clever way to force both of her tiles and allow himself to add four of his five tiles to his own line, making the final score 24-21.

This left Heli needing a 4-tile win in the final game, space-Helly-2001-10-28-1659. Surely Wolfgang would play safe this time, wouldn't he? The players were even at 3-3 after the first six moves. If my opponent had had the run of the tiles so far in the session, I would played 'safe' and looped off Heli's loose green corner on move 7, but Wolfgang's choice was clever and would probably have been better in most circumstances. He played a YRY tile at the bottom of the Tantrix, giving him the choice of forced spaces on either side of it to fill with a single forced tile. The idea was to fill the right-hand forced space, leaving the other one blocked, blocking one end of each player's line, which would have given him an advantage because the other end of Heli's line was already blocked.

It never seems to be a good idea to take risks when your opponent is on a lucky streak though. The fact that the forced tile indirectly connected two of Heli's tiles on the bottom right of the Tantrix soon turned out to be more important than it looked. Feeling that maybe the tiles were on her side today, Heli took a chance and turned her fledgling right-hand line towards the blocked forced space. She was right to feel lucky and her courage was rewarded - after that move she drew a tile that unblocked the top end of her line, and then immediately drew the perfect tile for the other blocked forced space, connecting her main line to the recently-created line at the bottom.

Heli was then 10-6 ahead, but at first sight it did not look too bad for Wolfgang because it looked like he could play a yellow corner at the bottom right of the Tantrix and take his indirect line length to 12 with only one gap. However, it was probably too risky to do this and ignore the threat that because Heli had a straight green tile which would fit just below the top right-hand corner of the Tantrix, she would be able to play a GR tile on the top right-hand corner on her next free move, taking her line length to 13 and quite possibly making Wolfgang have to waste time fending off a potential big loop. With Heli not having a GRG tile, maybe Wolfgang would have been better off adding the tiles to his own line - he might even have ended up able to block Heli completely at the top of the Tantrix later on - but I am not surprised he decided against it.

Well, that was my analysis of how he might be thinking when he clearly decided against adding to his line at the bottom, but in the event he did not try to block Heli's threat at the top right (not that it would have been easy) and the dreadful move 14 he did eventually play ended up losing him the match. He played a YBY on the left-hand side, turning the top end of his line down the left-hand side of the Tantrix towards the single gap near the other end of his line. This forced in a yellow straight he already had in his hand and appeared to force in the YYGBBG tile in Heli's hand which would in turn force the gap in his line to be filled.

The fatal miscalculation was that with his free move, he had created a forced space at the top, at the end of Heli's line, and Heli could use the YYGBBG tile to fill that space instead. This was catastrophic for Wolfgang, because there were only two tiles left which could fill the forced space which was blocking his line in two places, only one of which could be played there before the endgame - and the one which could fit in the endgame would create a three-Y unfillable space at the gap in his line. We could not believe our eyes and probably nor could Heli - unless the luck had swung and Wolfgang had either picked up a tile to fill the forced space at the top before Heli's turn or ended up getting the single tile he needed for the blocked forced space very quickly, she was now looking at almost certain victory!

Wolfgang then started playing well, again just too late. His move 21 left a blocked forced space at the left-hand end of Heli's line which had only one tile left in the bag to fill it and also ended up forcing in a YRY which would link to his line if the tile he needed for the crucial forced space did come out.

With her previous move, Heli had added to her own line and cleverly wasted three yellows and with free move 24, she did the same again and, now predictably, picked up the tile she needed to unblock her line, just before Wolfgang had the chance to create a lookalike. It was now 16-9 to Heli.

Although Heli's lines were far apart, the shape of the Tantrix seemed to give Wolfgang the potential to block both ends of it by playing a tile at the top right-hand corner of the Tantrix on move 29. He tried this, but played what I thought was (and what statistically was) only the third best tile here and effectively only blocked the right-hand end of Heli's line. Move 34 was clever, since it ended up creating a lookalike for the tile Wolfgang needed the most. She was very lucky (about a 1 in 3 chance) to pick up that tile before she had to play another tile in the lookalike though, and to add insult to injury yet again, it also gave her the threat of adding five more tiles to her line at the top if Wolfgang did not do anything about it.

With all of the tiles out of the bag, it was 19-12 to Heli, Wolfgang's 12 being a loop of six 'wasted' tiles. Having to counter Heli's threat of adding five tiles, the only way he could find to do it was to add three tiles to her line instead. In the end, the combination of her doing what she does best, Wolfgang playing into her hands and the tiles being on her side gave Heli the game by no less than 12 tiles, 25-13, so she won the match by 72.2-67.8 TPs, the closest result in any match since Round 3.

Her heart still beating at double speed after the final game, and understandably elated by her amazing win, Heli described it as "the most exciting game of Tantrix I have ever played!" Wolfgang was philosophical about the result, but clearly very disappointed at having let the match slip away.

(28 Oct)

On (their) Sunday evening, no. 11 seed Mike McManaway (NZL) and unseeded Leah Sanders (AUS) resumed the remaining QF with Mike well ahead by 39.3-20.7 TPs after winning two games in the first session, with the other drawn. Maybe Leah had drawn inspiration from Heli's remarkable recovery yesterday because she won both of the games in this session to edge ahead in the match by 50.3-49.7 TPs.

"What a disaster," said Mike ... and only the remaining games will tell how much of a disaster it might have been. Game 4 was very close, Leah managing to win by just one tile, 21-20, but game 5, M!Bell-mikem-2001-10-29-0832, provided the real drama of the session.

Mike raced ahead at the start, and after move 16 he was 14-7 ahead. Leah's free move 17 built an indirect line of 6 along the bottom of the Tantrix, but in setting up the chance for it to become linked to her line of 7, she created a RR next to the forced space which was blocking her line, reducing the number of tiles left that would fit that space before the endgame from four to two. Maybe she was feeling lucky - if so, she was right to, as we will see.

Maybe Mike should have tried to create a lookalike for the tile which would be best from Leah's point of view for that forced space, but the move 21 he did play (adding two tiles to his own line and keeping the right-hand ends of Leah's lines apart as well as blocking one of them) looked safe too. However, Mike was very unlucky with the next tile drawn, which fitted the forced space he had just blocked Leah's line with, and was the only one of the four tiles left which could have fitted that forced space and also allowed Leah to link the right-hand ends of her lines with her next free move. Now Leah was threatening as big a loop as Mike, and hers was much closer to completion.

On move 25, Mike created a lookalike for the crucial forced space referred to two paragraphs ago, but had no time to put it to good use when Leah was fortunate enough to pick up the tile she wanted just a couple of tile draws later. She then picked up one of the three tiles she needed to complete her loop, with the other two already in her hand, and the game was all over bar the shouting, finishing 40-24 to Leah. I am not quite sure why Leah went over time in that game, when it was decided well before the end, but have not looked at it in enough detail to work it out.

Game 6 was played about 12 hours later. There were lots of spectators, not least Heli Niemi (FIN), having a look at her potential semi-final opponents. When I joined them at move 26, Mike was about to go 15-10 ahead, had just blocked Leah's line along the controlled lower right-hand side of the Tantrix, and looked in a very commanding position ... though there was only one tile left in the bag that could fill the forced space blocking the top end of his line.

Then disaster struck near the other end of Mike's line. The tile Mike picked up after move 26 filled a forced space he had just created. Although there was a 1 in 2 chance of the first tile to fill that forced space being the one which wasted four yellow tiles in a small loop, Mike was unlucky that it came out immediately, since it also unblocked the controlled side for Leah and allowed four tiles to be added to her line by the end of her next turn.

In a painfully close game game where taking every chance to add to one's line indirectly or directly was now vital, Mike wasted move 35. He took trouble ensuring that the straight red which would fit the forced space currently blocking the right-hand ends of both players' lines could not be played, thinking that if it could, Leah might be able to use the RBYRYB tile still in the bag to complete a 17-tile loop. It would have been a clever move had he counted correctly, but it was actually unnecessary because the RBYRYB tile was already out on the Tantrix!

On move 36, Leah failed to create a lookalike for the forced space at the end of Mike's line, but did ensure that he would not be able to add a small yellow line to that end of his main line if it did become unblocked. Mike was still a couple of tiles ahead as the last tile came out of the bag, but Leah played the endgame slightly better (her tiles giving her more scope too) and the game ended in a 19-19 draw.

This leaves Leah just ahead by 60.3-59.7 TPs, so to continue her fairytale run through the tournament she needs just another draw in the final game, which is scheduled for Monday 29 October at 21.00 GMT / Tuesday 07.00 AEST / 10.00 NZT. Leah's fans, clustered around the top of the Fantasy Tantrix table, will be keeping their fingers, toes and big fluffy ears (if they have them ...) well and truly crossed for her!

(29 Oct)

Thanks to semi-finalist Heli Niemi (FIN) (spotting weaknesses in her potential SF opponent's play already!) for pointing out that Mike's move 17 in game 6, M!Bell-mikem-2001-10-30-0004, looks like a mistake. It appears to me that it was compounded by an even bigger mistake while he was filling the forced spaces that it created, when he picked up a tile which could have made his original flawed plan turn out well after all but failed to play it.

Mike played a tile near the bottom left of the Tantrix, creating a long controlled side leading up to the top left end of his main line. Although it allowed him to waste a few of Leah's tiles, I can only assume he did this because he thought he could play tiles along the controlled side which would connect all the way up to his main line. I think he intended to play the BBYRYR tile which he actually played at move 19 in both the forced space where he did play it and the forced space above, without realising that he had used the same tile in his calculations twice.

What looks really crazy though, is that when he was about to play the forced tile at move 19, the display would have changed to make it fairly obvious that he had miscalculated, but after playing the fateful free move 17, he had been lucky enough to draw a straight yellow tile which, had he played it at move 19, would have allowed his ambitious plan to work after all.

Mike ended that turn not having added any of the tiles along that side to his line, and blocking his line at a forced space which could only be filled by one tile and which did not become unblocked until move 39 - and might have remained blocked forever if Leah had taken one of many chances to create a lookalike space.

So, Leah may have had more luck with the tiles yesterday overall, but when she has shown that she will skilfully make the most of any chance she gets, and her opponent lets luck of his own just pass him by, you have to conclude that she probably deserves any chances she gets!

High drama today in the last session of the quarter-finals as unseeded Leah Sanders (AUS) held her nerve brilliantly to knock out the no. 11 seed, Tantrix inventor Mike McManaway (NZL) and take her amazing run (in which she has already had to win through no less than six rounds) to just one step from the the final. A tournament débutante who had a lobby ranking of under 800 at the start of the tournament, Leah has proved that Tantrix (with little or no 'bookwork' to learn because every game is different) is a game that people with real potential can improve at very quickly indeed.

Leading by just 0.6 TPs after six games, Leah needed a draw to win the match. The last game, M!Bell-mikem-2001-10-30-2357, was very blocked, just what Mike would not have wanted (does anyone else think the final position looks like a tiger yawning?), but Leah's position was looking good before the game became messy.

With hindsight, Leah probably won the game with free moves 23 and 25, which created lookalikes for the most important forced space in the game. Even so, she was extraordinarily lucky to pick up the tiles which would have allowed Mike to connect two of his main lines just a few moves later (after moves 29 and 31), before they could be filled with anything else. However, assuming moves 23 and 25 had indeed been played to take advantage of this, they were the best moves she could possibly have made to give herself a chance under the circumstances and this lucky break was far from undeserved.

At the end of an agonising game for the inventor, Leah won the game 12-10 to take the match by 74.2-65.8 TPs, leaving herself feeling on top of the world and Mike feeling as sick as the proverbial parrot.

Looking back, it was an absolutely crazy match, with Mike unbeaten in the first three games (W2 D1 L0) then Leah unbeaten in the last four (W3 D1 L0), and while there has to be some sympathy for Mike, Leah has to be admired enormously for having the presence of mind needed to come back from the virtually dead against one of the strongest players in the world and for taking every chance that came her way as her opponent self-destructed in the later sessions. Victory must have been very sweet.

Leah is of course the first unseeded player ever to reach the semi-finals, and the first Australian since Zenon Kowalczyk (AUS) (the no. 4 seed at the time) reached the same stage on his way to the 1999 title. She will also be playing in the first all-female semi-final against one of the other surprise packages of this year's competition, Heli Niemi (FIN), the no. 28 seed. Whoever is the favourite for this match (I will leave this up to you to decide!), it will be the first time they have been playing in a match as the favourite to win it since at least Round 3.


THE SEMI-FINALS:

We have two fascinating semi-finals:

{13 - 1919}	Péter Petrecz	(34, Budapest, HUN)		v		Matt Peek	(18, Auckland, NZL)	{14 - 1917}
{28 - 1809}	Heli Niemi	(26, Kemi, FIN)		v		Leah Sanders	(37, Flaxton, AUS)	{Unseeded}

Four different countries are represented, both pairings look evenly matched (pre-tournament, there were are only two Elo rating points between Péter and Matt, so statistically we could expect the result to be 80.2-79.8 TPs!), both are northern hemisphere v southern hemisphere battles and both are between a player under 30 and a player over 30 ... and the Final is guaranteed to have one male and one female player in it once again. All four players are well known in the lobby, but as you can see there are plenty of factors to give you a reason (spurious or otherwise!) to cheer for one or other player in each semi-final, even if you do not know them well and do not have any of them in your Fantasy Tantrix team!

Congratulations to Auckland - the only city to produce a semi-finalist in each of the last three years. As if they weren't up themselves enough already! I am only this rude because some of them even admit this - have a look here if you don't believe me. :-)

(31 Oct)

Unseeded Leah Sanders (AUS) won the first game in her semi-final against no. 28 seed Heli Niemi (FIN) by ten tiles, 27-17, but Heli fought back to take the second game by eleven, 32-21, then came out just on top in a closely fought third game by 17-16 to lead by 33.5-26.5 TPs at the end of the first session. There is still a long way to go though.

Heli is the fastest player left in the tournament, just a bit quicker than the youngest semi-finalist. She seems to be practising more than any other of the semi-finalists, so it is hardly surprising if she feels she can play intuitively. However, if she is to actually win the World Championship, she may need to learn to make full use of her time to get the best possible margin in every game. She did win game 3, but Mike McManaway (NZL), maybe getting his own back for Heli's perceptive (not to mention merciless) analysis of his own play in the last round ;-), points out that she missed a simple chance to win by five tiles instead of one.

At 12-16 down halfway through the endgame, Heli played an apparently great move 51, which wasted Leah's last tile and laid the first tile in a 5-tile sequence which would have linked her left-hand line to her main line around a 'hole' at the top of the Tantrix and given her a 21-16 win which Leah was now powerless to prevent. However, Heli had clearly not played the move with the five-tile sequence in mind, because she did not notice it after Leah had played her tile either and just played four tiles onto the end of her main line to give herself a 17-16 win.

This has to be regarded as a huge blunder at this level, especially when Heli had around 10 minutes left to think about her moves. Maybe it is not too hard to understand though, especially given semi-final nerves. After being behind for virtually the whole game, I think many strong players would have seen the obvious one-tile win, been very relieved and played it out quickly without bothering to look for a better option. That, then, is a lesson for all of us, because you never know when one or two extra TPs might make the difference at the end of a match.

(01 Nov)

No doubt determined not to make any mistakes like the one that cut her margin of victory, Heli thought for longer than usual in her games today. In game 4, it seemed to have pay off, because she won that one by a clear 24-10 margin. This win, her third in a row after Leah had won game 1, gave Heli a commanding 50.5-29.5 TPs lead at the halfway stage of the match. This game, Bell-Helly-2001-11-02-0859, is thought by Heli to be worth a look.

However, Leah had not won through six rounds just to get rolled over in the semi-final, at least not without a fight, and had fought back from an even worse position against an even stronger opponent in her QF. She showed her remakable resilience yet again by winning the next two games 20-16 and 20-14 to take Heli's lead down to a single TP. Heli leads a tantalisingly close match by 60.5-59.5 TPs with two games left. It's far too close to call!

(02 Nov)

The tension in the semi-final between no. 28 seed Heli Niemi (FIN) and unseeded Leah Sanders (AUS) continued right to the end of the match. The game was fairly routine until Heli's move 17 created a controlled side with the left-hand end of Leah's line blocked right at the other end of it. Assuming she would be able to free the end of her line in the end, Leah started building another red line around the bottom of the Tantrix, which was indirectly linked to the blocked left-hand end of her main line and began to threaten a largish loop. Heli blocked as well as she could, but Leah was still quite unlucky that the top ends of her two lines got turned away from each other.

Leah's tile draw after move 41 will not have pleased her either, since it created a forced space on the crucial controlled side which could no longer be filled, though Heli could have created the same block two moves earlier too had she not concentrated on her own line instead.

With Heli now 22-12 up, it seemed that Leah had to ensure at all costs that she had the first free move once the bag was empty. That was not to be, but luckily for Leah, Heli was unable to find a way to block the indirect link in Leah's line or to force in Leah's three remaining red corner tiles using her own red corner tile (I cannot find a way either), so Leah was able to make the link after all - actually the result of a very good move 44 which had limited Heli's options here. It is however strange that Heli chose to add only one tile to her line with move 46 when she could have added two - maybe she thought Leah could block her if she left the end of her line too close to the Tantrix, and that she would then still be unable to stop Leah adding to her own line on her following move. I'm not sure Leah would have risked it, especially with little time left on her clock.

Leah then blundered badly, if understandably with only 30 seconds left before she went over time. She could have wasted both of Heli's remaining tiles and there were at least two ways to do this. Péter Petrecz (HUN) spotted one way - if Leah had played her BBGYGY tile on the right-hand side of the Tantrix, just below the 'hole' which was appearing there, that would have forced in one of Heli's tiles just above it (completing the 'hole') and the other just below it. Heli spotted another way - if Leah had played her BGRRBG at the bottom left, she would have forced one of Heli's tiles which would in turn have forced the other. So instead of losing 24-23, Leah lost game 7 by 25-23.

Game 8 was very unusual, the result being decided by two smallish loops. With move 9, Heli blocked both ends of Leah's line on the same controlled side but gave Leah the chance of a loop of 9 tiles (possibly one or two more) scoring 18. It looked like a calculated risk, Heli estimating that she could score at least the 15 she needed herself if Leah's loop did complete, and the risk paid off. Leah's move 11, attempting to turn Heli's two lines away from each other, actually ended up giving Heli an 8-tile loop ... and when her own loop was completed, the score was 18-16 to Leah. The score remained unchanged for the remaining 24 moves despite Leah's attempts to build a line longer than 18, and Heli had won the match by a margin of just 1 TP, 80.5-79.5, the players having won four games each.

What really brings home how close it was is that without Leah's oversight on move 51 of game 7, she would have only needed a two-tile win in game 8 and the actual result in that game would have given her the match by 80.1-79.9 TPs! What a tournament début it has been for Leah though - the most successful unseeded player in the World Championship ever, getting so close to the final, still in with the chance of a top three finish, and likely to end up with an Elo rating of 1950+.

Heli on the other hand deserves many congratulations as the lowest seeded player (28) ever to reach the Final. She is also the most northerly player ever to get anywhere near the final, coming from Kemi in Finland which is just south of the Arctic Circle. Funnily enough, at just 26 she will nevertheless be the oldest winner of the title since the knockout format started in 1999 if she wins the Final! She had already beaten three very strong players, and even though she might have been slightly fortunate in that they were three of the four most out of practice players among the seeds, they are all very experienced players who are very difficult to beat and she beat the first two by more than convincing margins.

(Update, posted on 06 Nov)

Leah points out quite rightly that game 7 also hinged on her tile draws after moves 41 and 42, which added three tiles to Heli's line. Had those tiles come out in the opposite order (a 50% chance), Heli would have scored three less than she actually did and Leah would probably have won the game.

(there's more to come about this game too - keep watching!)

The other semi-final will not be played until the weekend (or soon after) because Matt has important exams to sit - we wish him luck in those. Meanwhile, the Plate is getting exciting with the quarter-finals nearing completion (Ben Polman (NED) and Kathy Upton (AUS) have already qualified for the first SF, Ben having had another scare in his first Plate match but showing once again that he is very dangerous if he does get over that first hurdle) and brief news of that competition will be posted here from time to time over the next few days to stop you from getting report withdrawal symptoms while you wait for the other semi-final.

(10 Nov)

Many congratulations to no. 14 seed Matt Peek (NZL) who joined no. 28 seed Heli Niemi (FIN) in the Final to make it the second northern v southern hemisphere Final in a row. The over-30s seem unable to get past the SFs - Heli, 27 later this month, is the oldest finalist in three years with the knockout format. Matt won the middle six games in his semi-final (a marathion with all eight games played in a single session) to thrash no. 13 seed Péter Petrecz (HUN) by 98.8-61.2 TPs.

Tantrix inventor Mike McManaway (NZL) has provided the following report on this semi-final. Some of the comments leave a bit to your imagination, which will hopefully motivate you to dig up the games and have a look!

Game 1 - Both seemed to play well and I'd say Matt was just unlucky to lose by two tiles in the end, Péter winning 20-18.

Game 2 - Matt had a couple of lucky breaks and Péter blundered at the end, Matt winning 28-20.

Game 3 - Péter went for the double line opening!? I don't understand Matt's move 6 (very weird), nor Péter's reply. Overall though, both played well and the game could have gone either way but the tiles were on Matt's side and he won 33-23.

Game 4 - Péter went for two lines again - a doubtful strategy but it seemed to pay off for him. Move 28 is a bit doubtful and move 29 is very interesting - it would not have been my choice but I see Matt's logic. At the end Péter was unlucky, running short on RB tiles, and Matt edged the game by 20-19.

Game 5 - A good move 4 from Péter and a good reply from Matt too. For some reason, Matt started a second line on move 9! By the middle game, Péter was slighly ahead, then made a very unusual move 20 which did not pay off. He also made a risky move 29 which did seem to turn out well for him but the tiles were on Matt's side just before the endgame and he won 24-21.

Game 6 - Notable for a stunningly bad move 4 from Matt followed by a strange reply from Péter. The game ended up very blocked and when it eventually became unblocked, Matt nearly got a lucky big loop. Though Péter diverted it, the diversion gave Matt the extra tiles he needed to win the game 23-22.

Game 7 - Péter made the strange choice of forcing Matt into a 20-tile loop very early in the game. A big mistake I would say, especially since Matt is one of the best blockers around, even when he has to concentrate on his own line too. With only Péter's line to worry about, Matt had no trouble restricting it to 14 to win 20-14 to win his sixth game in a row and gain rather more than the 1.1 TPs he had needed to ensure victory in the match with one game to spare.

Game 8 - Matt was unfortunate that his clever move 8 did not work and the game went Péter's way from then on to give him a consolation 23-16 win and keep Matt's TP score to just under 100.

Can Matt now break the Final jinx which has seen New Zealanders finish as runners-up for the last two years? Péter will play Leah Sanders (AUS) in the play-off for 3rd place. Over 600 games have now been played in this year's WTC and Plate combined.

(Plate update by Phil Sneddon, 15 Nov)

Jamie Sneddon (NZL) won his Plate QF against Pierre Sanchez (FRA), winning the first three games and then losing the two games in the final session spectacularly by 15 and 16 tiles to win the match by the slender margin of 51.1-48.9 TPs. Jamie meets fellow New Zealander and Aucklander Bevan Chong (NZL) in the second semi-final of this year's remarkably strong Plate competition in which many of the strong players who were knocked out of the main draw in their first match have found their form again.

In the first semi-final which had already been completed, Ben Polman (NED) beat Kathy Upton (AUS), winning three of the five games to advance to the final by 57.5-42.5 TPs. Before the draw was made, Ben and Kathy had been talking about meeting one another in the final! They have both done very well to advance this far.

(Fantasy Tantrix update by Phil Sneddon, 15 Nov)

Raymond Hemmecke (USA) is confirmed as the winner of the Fantasy Tantrix competition, having amassed 1645 points, an unassailable lead of 184 points over his nearest rival Bronwyn Venus (AUS) even before the Final has been played. With many of the most popular picks among the seeded players suffering early exits, the strategy of choosing mainly low-cost players has been successful this year and has served Raymond well. Even though he did not pick either of the finalists, Raymond's selections included the two losing semi-finalists and three of the four unseeded players who made it to the last 32 in total and the most exceptional part of his win is the fact that he has led the competition virtually from start to finish.

Even though there were more than 50 entrants, only Jukka Heikkilä (FIN) managed to pick both finalists (he may even have managed to pick the top three depending on the result of the third place playoff), but the rest of his selections all went out in their first matches so he is in 16th place at the moment. However, with 180 more points assured from the Final, he will end up in the top 10.

Nobody will want poor Jarno van den Boom (NED) to pick them next year. He is in last place with 419 points and six of the seven players in the top eight seeds whom he picked went out in their first matches! :-)

(21 Nov)

The 3rd/4th place playoff started today, no. 13 seed Péter Petrecz (HUN) winning both games in the first session to lead unseeded Leah Sanders (AUS) by 28.9-11.1 TPs.

The 3rd/4th place playoff in the Plate was played today too. Kathy Upton (AUS) took a big early lead by winning the first two games, but Bevan Chong (NZL) recovered brilliantly to win the last three games to win by just 50.9-49.1 TPs. He has finished in the top three of a tournament no less than three times this year - a tournament win cannot be far off.

(25 Nov)

Unseeded Leah Sanders (AUS) was 11.1-28.9 TPs down against no. 13 seed Péter Petrecz (HUN) after their first session, but came back to stun him today by winning the first three games of the final session, two of them by just one tile but the middle one by 18, 38-20, to leave Péter needing to win by at least seven tiles in the final game. He was ahead throughout a very tense game 6, but despite looking like he might have chances at times could not quite do it. The final score was an exceptionally close 60.7-59.3 TPs to Leah.

Congratulations to Leah, who won seven of her eight matches (one of them a default, but still an amazing feat) and beat three of the top 16 seeds (Steven Trezise (GBR) in Round 4, Mike McManaway (NZL) in the QFs and Péter in this match) on her way to becoming the first unseeded player to figure in the top three of the World Championship. (27 Nov-12 Dec)

Jamie Sneddon (NZL) won the Plate Final (played over three sessions) against European Champion Ben Polman (NED) by 58.9-41.1 TPs. Probably vying with Bevan Chong (NZL) to be the best player never to have won a tournament, Jamie had previously finished second in three tournaments. Maybe breaking his duck in this competition will help him to go forward to win one of the major tournaments next year.

A separate page contains Reports on the Final.

Reports on the Final

Assistant Controller's Report

Results from: ROUND 1     ROUND 2     ROUND 3 (seeds 17-32 join)
ROUNDS 4 -> FINAL (seeds 1-16 join) - Draw & Results
FANTASY TANTRIX:    Home     Results so far
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