Since Round 4 is of more current interest, I have decided to get it up to date and (for now at least) to ignore the backlog of R2/R3 reports that arose while the system was down. I will try to briefly fill in the gaps in R2/R3 on the original reports page at a later date.


ROUND 4:

Introduction

The last 16 in this year's World Tantrix Championship includes players from 8 of the 21 countries that were represented in the original list of entrants. There are 4 players from NZL (all in the top half of the draw), 4 from the UK, 3 from HUN and 1 each from FIN, FRA, GER, NED and the USA. AUS is the only major Tantrix-playing country not to be represented after its players fell went down to more shock results than those of any other country in the first three rounds.

Half of the top 16 seeds made it to the last 16, including 5 of the top 8. Only two of them (Péter and Heli) will play each other in R4 and only one R4 match (the unseeded pairing of János and Will) does not contain at least one top 16 seed.

The other players who made it this far are made up of three other (17-32) seeds, three of the first dozen players just outside the seeding places (not too surprising, since I remember saying at the start of the tournament that although virtually all of the top 32 looked like worthy seeds, there were another 6-12 players who just missed out who would have been equally worthy seeds and it was a pity that we had to stop at 32!) and two players who looked like complete outsiders at the start of the tournament.

Ages of the last 16 range from 13 to 41, cf. 10 to 54 for the original entrants and the male:female ratio in the last 16 is a somewhat shocking 14:2 this year, which suggests that the male v female Finals of the last two years may not be repeated. A third northern hemisphere v southern hemisphere Final in a row does look more than possible though.

Preview of Ben Polman (NED) v Dave Dyer (USA)

No. 16 seed and 2001 European Champion Ben Polman (NED) has scored more than 70 TPs in all three of his matches so far. His toughest test so far was against no. 19 seed Murray Pharaoh (NZL) in R3, which he won with four big wins, one draw and one very big loss.

He faces no. 26 seed Dave Dyer (USA), 3rd in the Pan Am for the last two years and having his best-ever WTC. Dave is the only player from the Americas left in the tournament. He has come through even tougher tests than Ben - he beat Hungarian Champion László Harsányi (HUN) in R2 before really announcing his presence in this year's event by beating no. 2 seed Leah Sanders (AUS) in R3 with four wins and two losses.

A potentially close one this - Ben's pre-WTC Elo rating was 1887 and Dave's was 1852, implying that statistically the expected average score over an infinite number of 6-game matches is is 63.0-57.0 TPs to Ben but that Dave has a highish 45% chance of winning any given 6-game match.

(Sun 6 Oct)

Ben Polman (NED) won game 1 against Dave Dyer (USA) by two tiles but Dave came back strongly to win games 2 and 3 by 9 and 4 tiles respectively and he leads by 36.8-23.2 TPs after the first session.

Preview of Jérôme Papillon (FRA) v Mike McManaway (NZL)

No. 20 seed Jérôme Papillon (FRA) is also coming back to form, with comfortable wins over World Junior Champion Simon Wright (GBR), by four games to one, and fast-improving Jessica Tebbe (GER), by four games to two, to his credit in the last two rounds.

He faces no. 7 seed Mike McManaway (NZL), the Tantrix inventor and 1999 Pacific Champion who also finished 3rd in the 2000 WTC. After one of the biggest wins in R1, Mike had to work much harder against Stacy Henwood (NZL), eventually scraping through (effectively only on winning margins) by just 51.3-48.7 TPs after the players won two games each with one drawn. He then brought the unexpectedly strong run ofThomas Jarl (SWE) to an end with a four win/two loss victory in R3.

This is another potentially close match - Mike's pre-WTC Elo rating was 1929 and Jérôme's was 1870, implying that statistically the expected average score over an infinite number of 6-game matches is 65.0-55.0 TPs to Mike but that Jérôme has a 42% chance of winning any given 6-game match.

(Mon 7 Oct)

Mike McManaway (NZL) made a strong start against Jérôme Papillon (FRA), winning their first game by 8 tiles, but Jérôme won game 2 by 3 tiles to cut Mike's lead to 21.5-18.5 TPs at the end of the first session of a three session match.

Preview of János Püspöki (HUN) v William Brooks (GBR)

Unseeded János Püspöki (HUN) and 13-y-o William Brooks (GBR) are two of the rising stars of this year's WTC. János was the runner-up in this year's Hungarian Championship but has not previously made a big breakthrough in an international tournament and Will's only tournament experience before the WTC was 6th place in the British Open Table Tantrix Championship on his way to winning the overall top prize for performances at Mind Sports Olympiad Cambridge.

János has been very impressive indeed so far, at least since Mark Harris (IRL) gave him a big scare by winning their first two games in R1. Like the eventual champion in his first match last year, János recovered by winning the last three games to scrape through against Mark and has since swept all before him, with an amazing five games to nil win against an admittedly off-form no. 8 seed Wolfgang Schwarz (GBR) in R2 and a reasonably comfortable win against no. 17 seed Kevin Baird (GBR) in R3. At one stage, János had won no less than 11 WTC games in a row!

One of the fastest players around, Will has beaten two seeds on his way to the last 16, in both cases keeping his nerve to triumph in very close matches. In R2, he beat no. 32 seed Anthony Sanders (AUS) by three games to two then followed that up with an even more impressive win against no. 12 seed and 2001 Pacific Champion Britta Steude (NZL) by 61.2-58.8 TPs, winning three games to two with one drawn.

Although János has the edge in the Elo ratings, they do not tell us much in this case because Will's rating is only provisional and both players' ratings, especially János's, look likely to rise very significantly at the end of this WTC based on the matches they have played so far.

(Wed 9 Oct)

János Püspöki (HUN) won the first game against William Brooks (GBR) by 8 tiles but Will's impressive 12-tile win in game 2 gave him the edge after the first two games. That was the only sniff at a QF place that Will was to get though, because János continued to show his sparkling form from the earlier rounds, reeling off the remaining four games to end up with comfortable victory by 77.4-42.6 TPs.

This match, played in a single session, involved only 1 hr 10 mins of playing time, about half the time most of the other matches in this round will take.

Preview of Peter West (NZL) v Shaun Cooper (NZL)

Unseeded Peter West (NZL) let other players in his section do the hard work of knocking out the seeds before bringing them back down to earth with a bump in their next matches, with convincing wins over Malcolm Wotton (GBR) (the conqueror of 2000 World Champion and no. 15 seed Julia Schwarz (GBR)) and Jacques Giraud (FRA) (the conqueror of no. 22 seed Tamás Köpeczi Bócz (HUN)) in Rounds 2 and 3.

So, Peter's first seeded opponent will be the no. 3 seed Shaun Cooper (NZL), last year's NZ Champion. Shaun has never quite fulfilled his obvious potential in the WTC, tending to go out against other strong players just before things got really interesting, but after a comfortable if not very convincing first two rounds he was very impressive against Raymond Hemmecke (GER) in R3, winning five of his six games against the player who had narrowly beaten no. 28 seed Frank Heyer (FRA) in R2.

Although Peter's Elo rating of 1784 is only provisional, Shaun with an Elo rating of 1956 has a clear edge based on past tournament performance. So, unless Peter finds a way to scare Shaun early on, this match could turn out to be more one-sided than most of the other matches in this round.

(Fri 11 Oct)

Shaun Cooper (NZL) looks to be cruising to victory against Peter West (NZL), who could not find a way to hurt the no. 3 seed in the first session of their match. Shaun won all three games by 5 tiles or more to lead by 46.3-13.7 TPs.

No. 7 seed Mike McManaway (NZL) won game 3 against no. 20 seed Jérôme Papillon (FRA) by one tile to increase his lead at the start of their second session, but Jérôme claimed the biggest win of the match so far by completing a 16-tile loop to win game 4 by 14 and he now leads this predictably close match by 42.2-37.8 TPs.

(Sat 12 Oct)

No. 26 seed Dave Dyer (USA) started his second session against no. 16 seed Ben Polman (NED) in the same way as he finished the first session, winning games 4 and 5, this time by 5 tiles and 2 tiles respectively. This made it four games wins in a row and sealed Dave's first ever appearance in the QFs. Ben won the last game by 20 tiles, but it was too late to make a difference to the final results and Dave won the match by 67.7-52.3 TPs to set up a QF against János Püspöki (HUN), another player who is having a much better WTC than ever before.

Preview of Miklos Hansel (HUN) v Tom McCoy (GBR)

Miklos Hansel (HUN) finished 3rd in this year's Hungarian Championship and only just missed out on a seeding place for the WTC. He had a tough draw and has done extremely well to come through to this stage. His closest shave was against Bruno Fillon (FRA) in R1, when all Bruno had to do in game 5 was to stop Miklos winning by more than 7 tiles. Miklos somehow managed to find a way to win by 12 and took the match by just 50.8-49.2 TPs. Miklos then scored impressive if still quite close victories against no. 21 seed Josh Button (AUS), the current Australian champion, and no. 14 seed Bevan Chong (NZL), the runner-up in last year's Pacific Championship.

His opponent, no. 5 seed Tom McCoy (GBR), won the British Open Table Tantrix Championship this year and put up probably the most impressive performances in the group phase and the last 16 of the European Championship before going down to Marion Scott (GBR) in a close QF. Tom has been impressive in this year's WTC too, winning four games in each of his three matches so far, which include wins against Pan Am runner-up James Mihalisin (USA) in R2 and compatriot Mauro Lazzara (GBR) in R3, who had beaten no. 24 seed Pierre Sanchez (FRA) in R2.

Miklos' pre-WTC Elo rating was 1801 and Tom's 1953, implying that statistically the expected average score over an infinite number of 6-game matches is is 72.8-47.2 TPs to Tom but that Miklos has a reasonable 31% chance of winning any given 6-game match.

(Mon 14 Oct)

The Hungarian players seem intent on gaining revenge on the UK players for walking all over them in the European Championship, and Miklos Hansel (HUN) drew first blood against Tom McCoy (GBR) this evening in what is turning out to be a very exciting match. In game 1, Tom threatened a large loop and Miklos an even larger one but Miklos' line was more blocked than Tom'm, including one crucial indirect link on a controlled side along the top of the Tantrix.

Who got the first free move in the endgame was always going to be crucial and the game turned on Tom's tile draw at move 34. Tom drew one of the three tiles that could have filled a gap in Miklos' line before the endgame. It was the one that did him the least favours, giving Miklos the chance to waste the rest of the tiles in the bag and get the first free move. Miklos took this chance very well, playing the right tiles in the forced spaces to ensure that he emptied the bag before his next free move, and eventually won the game by 5 tiles.

For most of game 2, Miklos looked like he was the player in control, keeping the ends of his lines freer which allowed him to construct a longer line than Tom. However, a chance for Tom to make an 11-tile loop appeared from nowhere towards the end of the game and with his longest line not having the potential to catch up with Miklos', Tom played to get his loop as close to completion as possible. I think Miklos failed to play the best blocking move after that (though it would require further analysis to be sure) but whether Tom's loop would complete still depended partly on how the remaining tiles came out of the bag. They went Tom's way and he won the game by 4 tiles.

So, two very tight games to start the match, with each player needing luck as well as skill to win the games that they won.

Tom admits that in game 3, he should have added to his line at the bottom of the Tantrix in the latter stages of the game rather than going for a draw, and that he should not have overlooked the hidden threat of some of the forced spaces - Miklos was eventually able to add two tiles to his line along the RH controlled side which Tom had not anticipated. Miklos won that game by 2 tiles and Tom also dropped a time penalty without any gain - the extra time did not help him to improve the final result.

Tom then foolishly (or perhaps cleverly as it turned out!) decided to play unscheduled game 4. He got off to a convincing start and was also helped by the run of the tiles later in the game to eventually win it by 4 tiles.

By the end of the first session, each player had won two games, but none of them had been decided by more than 5 tiles. The tile scores alone would make the score 40.5-39.5 TPs to Tom, but the unnecessary time penalty given up by Tom in game 3 means that it is actually Miklos who leads by that same score.

Tom feels that he played a bit scrappily in all of the games in this session, and I would have to agree from what I saw. On the other hand, Miklos (despite a few small errors of his own) looked to be playing very well. It remains to be seen whether Tom can take control of the match when it resumes on Wednesday or whether Miklos can continue his good form, make Tom panic and become the second Hungarian so far to reach the QFs.

(Tue 15 Oct)

Unseeded Peter West (NZL) was three games down after the first session of his match against no. 3 seed Shaun Cooper (NZL) but a big 10-tile win in game 4 gave him a little bit of hope. His margin of victory was bigger than the margins in any of Shaun's three wins, which meant that if Peter could manage to win the two remaining games as well, he would have a good chance of going through.

However, last year's NZ Champion quickly shut the door on any plans Peter might have had for a spectacular comeback. Shaun won games 5 and 6 by 8 and 9 tiles respectively to record the biggest win of the round so far by 81.9-38.1 TPs. It will be Shaun's second QF in an individual event this year but only his first in the WTC - in the previous three years, he has gone out in the last 32, the last 32 again and then the last 16. It seems that Shaun gets closer to Final as the years go by, even though the ever-increasing number of entrants should make this harder, not easier!

Preview of Matt Peek (NZL) v Eleanor Gordon (GBR)

In the last 12 months, no. 1 seed Matt Peek (NZL) has won the 2001 World and 2002 NZ Championships, become the first ever Tantrix Grand Master, captained New Zealand A to the first ever World Team Championship title and recorded by far the longest ever winning streak in tournament games. He also well in front of both the Elo ratings and the master rankings. Does this make him unbeatable in a long tournament match at the moment?

Well, after thrashing Macedonian entrant Zoran Tomovski (MKD)in R1, he was severely tested by unseeded but fast-improving Matthias Neumeister (GER) in R2, going 2 games to 1 down in the first session and thinking he was on his way out before rallying to win the last two games. Normal service was resumed in R3 when Thierry Berguin (FRA), the victor over no. 29 seed Ilona Halbach (GER) in R2, was unceremoniously dumped out of the tournament by 6 games to 0.

Six months ago, the idea of his unseeded opponent 16-y-o Eleanor Gordon (GBR) getting to this stage would have been dismissed as a pipe dream by just about everybody when she came 8th out of 8 in her European Championship qualifying group. She has surprised everyone by getting this far in the WTC but traces the beginning of her huge improvement back to the World Team Championship, when despite her team GBR C getting knocked out in R1, she herself scored a fine double win against Ilona Halbach, spurred on by a desire not to let her team down which made her concentrate much better than she had before.

Eleanor has avoided seeded players so far, but has had some fine wins against those who have knocked out seeded players, and all of her matches have been exciting. She was behind after three games against Peter Henderson (AUS) but won the last two games to progress to a R2 meeting with Peter Hinton (GBR), who had knocked out no. 31 seed Kathy Upton (AUS) in R1. She won her first two games against Peter and looked like she was coasting to victory after the first session, but wins by Peter in games 3 and 4 put the result in doubt before Eleanor held her nerve to win game 5, and with it the match.

Eleanor's R3 opponent, Steven Wiley (USA), had knocked out Pan-American Champion and no. 10 seed Brad Swanlund (USA) in R2. Steve was her toughest opponent so far and he won two of the first three games to lead at the halfway point before Eleanor found some real inspriation from somewhere and reeled of the last three games one after the other to take the match.

Although Eleanor's Elo rating of 1528 is only provisional and will rise significantly as a result of this tournament, Matt is easily the world no. 1 with an Elo rating of 2028 and could walk all over his opponent for the second round in a row unless Eleanor can find a way to stop him from blocking her out of existence and stay in touch early in the match. You can bet that Eleanor is working hard on finding a way to achieve one of the biggest shock results in Tantrix history and that she will have huge support from all those who like to see the underdog win.

(Wed 16 - Fri 18 Oct)

I hope to get a chance over this weekend to report on the three missing match sessions which were played on the above dates.

Preview of Péter Petrecz (HUN) v Heli Niemi (FIN)

This is one of the most intriguing matches of the round, with both players having finished in the top four of the WTC last year and both seeded in the top nine this year. No. 6 seed Péter Petrecz (HUN) has the better overall record in tournaments, with a European Championship win and two 3rd places to his credit, but no. 9 seed Heli Niemi (FIN) has done better than Péter in the last two major tournaments - she finished 2nd in the 2001 WTC against 4th for Péter and reached the 2002 Euro QFs whereas Péter failed to qualify from his group, though Péter has had harder draws in both cases.

In this year's WTC, Péter has met/allowed very little resistance so far. He did not have the toughest draw of all in the early rounds, but even so winning 13 his first 14 games and losing the one he lost (to Andreas N (FRA) in R2) by only one tile was a very impressive start to the tournament. This run included four wins his first four games against unseeded but fast-improving Catherine Moxham (NZL) (who had beaten no. 23 seed Martin Harlow (GBR), if only just, in R2), though once his win was assured, Péter did let up a bit in the last two games and Cat played better and won them so that their match ended up a bit closer than it otherwise might have.

Heli may not have scored quite as heavily as Péter in the first three rounds, but she has never looked in much danger either. She was three games up and only 0.5 TPs from victory against Michael Drewett (AUS) in R1 before a loss and a draw made that result look a bit closer. Heli did lose her first game against Brigitte Empt (GER) in R2 but recovered quickly and won all of the remaining four games. In R3, Heli faced a repeat of last year's last 16 match against Yoseph Phillips (ISR) and she played well to win by four games to two, the TP margin made wider by Yoseph dropping no less than nine time penalties.

Péter's pre-WTC Elo rating was 1934 and Heli's 1913, implying that statistically the expected average score over an infinite number of 6-game matches is is 61.8-58.2 TPs to Péter but that Heli has a 47% chance of winning any given 6-game match. So, while most matches at this stage of the WTC are too close to call, this one is even harder to predict than most!

(Fri 18 Oct)

The first half of the match between Péter Petrecz (HUN) and Heli Niemi (FIN) was just as close as their similarlity in ratings/seedings had suggested. Péter looked to be winning game 1 but lost his lead when he got into time trouble and Heli played the ending more accurately than he did. The game ended up as a 25-25 draw. Heli then edged an even more exciting second game by just 1 tile before Péter hit back with a win by just two tiles in game 3. At 30.6-29.4 TPs to Péter, it could hardly have been closer!

The players did decide to play game 4 though, and this at last allowed one of them to open up a bigger gap. Péter won the game by 22-16 to lead the match by 45.9-34.1 TPs with two games left over for the final session. Will Heli be able to win game 5 and get back into the match or will game 4 turn out to have been Péter's decisive break?

Preview of Dave Dyer (USA) v János Püspöki (HUN)

This is due to be the first QF to start. No. 26 seed Dave Dyer (USA), who programs the Tantrix java applet and hence is one of the people without whom we would not have a WTC at all, is the first American to reach the QFs of the WTC for three years, since Ben Trumbore (USA) lost to eventual champion Zenon Kowalczyk (AUS) on total tiles tie-break at the same stage in 1999. Indeed, no Americans even reached the last 16 in 2001, which is some measure of Dave's achievement this time around.

Although like Dave he is a relatively experienced player, the rise to prominence of János Püspöki (HUN) this year has been even more meteoric, and as can be seen from the preview of his R4 match further up this page, he has been very convincing in his run to the QFs, with plenty of Hungarian support to sustain him throughout.

Dave has finished 3rd in the last three Pan-American Championships and János finished 2nd in this year's Hungarian Championship but neither player has done very well in international tournaments before despite plenty of attempts, so in many ways this is the breakthrough year for both of them internationally.

The players' pre-tournament Elo ratings suggest that Dave has the edge (the expected average score over an infinite number of 7-game matches is 78.6-61.4 TPs to Dave with János having a 37% chance of winning the match) but it is already clear that the ratings of both players are likely to rise significantly once the WTC is taken into account, so those statistics may be a bit spurious for these particular players this far through the tournament.

Preview of Andreas Kemerle (GER) v Kevin Scott (GBR)

No. 11 seed Kevin Scott (GBR) makes a habit of reaching the final stages of tournaments (QF of the 2001 Euro, 3rd in the 2002 Euro, 2nd in the 2002 British Open) but has not yet managed to be consistent enough to actually win a tournament and did not set the world alight in last year's WTC.

He has been pretty consistent so far in this WTC though, winning all of his matches by more than 25 TPs against opponents who have at least been good enough to be classed as 'potentially dangerous', such as John Waggott (GBR) in R2 and John Warden (USA) in R3, the latter some 'revenge' for John's win against Kevin's wife Marion, the no. 30 seed, in R2.

Andreas Kemerle (GER), only the second German representative ever to reach the last 16, has probably been the biggest surprise of the tournament so far and is easily the lowest ranked player (measured at the closing date for entries) to have made it to the last 16. He has been the underdog in every match. His only previous tournament experience was playing in the Germany B team in the WTTC and getting thrashed twice by Jérôme Papillon (FRA), a player he could yet meet again in the SFs here.

Since Andreas has been one of the main stories of the tournament so far and I have seen bits of two of Andreas' matches and been on the receiving end in one of them, I will say a bit more about the apparent reasons for his success in this tournament. This should not put Andreas at a disadvantage because knowing his style does not really help you to formulate a plan for coping with it, you just have to deal with it as it comes.

The transformation in his form seems to have started when he and Matthias Neumeister (GER) noticed that they were both due to meet one of the top four seeds in R2, which seems to have spurred them on to train like mad. This very nearly paid off for Matthias, who gave the no. 1 seed a big scare ...

... but it really did pay off for Andreas, who surprised higher-rated compatriot Christine Dreesen (GER) with a comfortable four games to one win in R1, and then dramatically knocked out European Champion and no. 4 seed Steven Trezise (GBR) in R2 in an agonisingly close match. Andreas would have lost that match before time penalties were taken into account but two time penalties were enough to tip him over the 50 TP mark and into R3, where he proved that his first two results were no fluke by beating the top-rated unseeded players Lutz Göhmann (GER) (who in turn had despatched the no. 18 seed quite comfortably in R2), only losing one out of their first five games.

Andreas still seems to be very weak in the endgame, but in this WTC his much higher-rated opponents have been finding it hard to still be close to him at that stage because his play early in the game has been stunning. Line-building is his biggest strength, as impressive and instinctive as any that I have seen.

Andreas also has a secret weapon - he uses the fact that he is the player with nothing to lose in each match to his advantage very intelligently by taking risks that rely on the tiles going his way. They are risks that none of his more experienced opponents would dare to take themselves because they would look so stupid if such risks did not come off, but nevertheless they are risks that could just about come off (and regularly have for Andreas in this tournament so far), not the type of no-hope risks that a beginner might take.

When you are playing against higher-rated players, you usually have to take intelligent risks like this if you want to have a chance of beating them and this is often a very good tactic in those situations. Even if such risks do not come off, they will make a nervous opponent who has everything to lose feel a lot more nervous and if one outrageous risk comes off, it can have spectacular results and after that, the opponent might even get so paranoid that they end up wasting moves defending things that realistically should not need to be defended.

With an Elo rating of 1911, Kevin will clearly be expected to win this match, but with Andreas playing the way he is in this tournament (setting himself up for a provisional rating of over 1900 based on his results so far) and still having nothing to lose, I doubt many people would bet a lot of money against him causing yet another surprise.

The first couple of games could be crucial - if Kevin can get a good start and dent Andreas' confidence a bit, it could be a rout but otherwise I expect it to be touch and go throughout and if lots of Andreas' risky plays work out early in the match, Kevin could end up very unnerved and even go down to big defeat himself. There, how's that for hedging my bets ;-)

(Mon 21 Oct, posted Tue 22 Oct)

Kevin Scott (GBR), the last British player left in the draw and, at no. 11, the top seed left in the bottom half of the draw which has seen far more shocks than the top half, started brightly against Andreas Kemerle (GER), looking to be well in control of game 1 despite it being close and eventually winning it by 4 tiles.

However, Andreas has not shocked three players ranked well above him for nothing, and he certainly was not going to roll over and hand Kevin the match. Game 2 left the onlookers stunned. It reminded me of my fifth and deciding game against Andreas in R2, when he played an innocent-looking move aimed only at stopping me from making a loop then picked up an amazing run of tiles which linked the blocking tile all the way down the LH side of the Tantrix and around the bottom to his main line.

Game 2 of this match was a bit different from my game, in that Andreas' short disconnected lines looked a bit less innocent this time and Kevin had already been having to decide on each move which of Andreas' fragments was the most dangerous and most in need of being turned away from his main line. However, the outcome in game 2 of this match was far more spectacular than in R2g5, even if maybe not quite as crucial to the final match result.

Kevin was doing this very well though, and seemed to be out of immediate danger when Andreas played a tile that forced in a tile that did not really help his ambitions to connect at all ... then pulled out a tile that changed everything and allowed him to force connection of his RH and lower LH lines instead. By the time another run of favourable forced spaces had connected this line to his upper LH line and the tiles that came out as the endgame approached lengthened his line even further, Andreas had won the game by no less than 33-14! Spectators, opponents and quite probably Andreas himself gasped with amazement.

The fact that these miraculous-looking 'extra lines from nowhere' always seem to go up the LH side of the Tantrix (see also game 4 of this match, as well as R2 g5 and I think one of the R3 games too), partly mirroring the main line they are connecting to, is slightly weird ... and of course the fact that Andreas seems to get these 'extra lines from nowhere' so regularly, even when he is not playing for them in any way, suggests that they can't all be accidental.

Andreas himself very candidly said (by "email interview) that he would like to be able to say that he does a lot of things to make these extra lines happen, but he does not, though that he may be being a bit modest by implying that he does nothing to help these things to happen. Instead, if I am reading what he explained right, when he is playing important games, he shuts everything else out and concentrates really hard (this is very impressive in itself) and says that he sometimes just feels like an apparently unpromising move is going to bring out the right tiles to do something stunning and he plays it instinctively.

So, is this the kind of instinct we all get during winning runs when it seems like nothing can go wrong (an instinct which we lose completely during losing runs!) or have we discovered our first psychic/mystic Tantrix player? If so, what possibilities does that hold out? I am joking here for the sake of a good story of course :-) ... or then again, maybe I should just say that I think I'm joking ...

After all that excitement had got the pulses racing, game 3 was far more straightforward. For once, perhaps understandably lost in the excitement of his spectacular win in game 2, Andreas did not play the first half of game 3 that well. Kevin played clinically to take a big lead into the second half of the game and after an error by Andreas in the endgame allowed Kevin to add even more tiles than he would have expected, Kevin eventually won game 3 by 12 tiles to regain the lead in the match.

Game 4 was clearly going Kevin's way as well until, guess what, a secondary long line for Andreas seemed to appear out of virtually nothing on the LH side and ended up within one corner link of connecting to his main line. However, this space ended up on a controlled side, and Kevin ended up filling the forced spaces above the crucial space and creating a space that would have forced Andreas to play the missing link in his own line on his next turn, except that Kevin also got the first free move in the endgame and was able to block the missing link in an unfillable space.

So, the 'extra line from nowhere' was thwarted at last. Could this be the beginning of end? Well, Kevin leads by 49.5-30.5 TP and Andreas only has two games left in which to claw back that deficit. The match is is still sure to be a nail-biter when it resumes on Tuesday.

(Tue 22 Oct, posted Tue 22 Oct)

After yesterday's session, you would have thought that the match between no. 11 seed Kevin Scott (GBR) and Andreas Kemerle (GER) could not get much more dramatic, but in some ways it did.

Kevin started off game 5 the stronger and started to threaten a big loop, but Andreas was able to do the same after an attempt by Kevin to turn his line away from a medium loop threat backfired when he picked up an unfortunate tile for a forced space he had created, thereby allowing Andreas to threaten an even bigger loop.

The most important phase of the game started with move 36. While it would be hard to describe Andreas' move as a mistake, I think he might have been better advised to play his YYGBGB tile to fill the indirect link of his line, thereby stopping Kevin from blocking Andreas along a controlled side and forcing Kevin's sixth tile onto the end of Kevin's own line, which would have turned it towards a permanently blocked forced space.

As it turned out though, Andreas did not need waste any moves blocking one end of Kevin's line, because Kevin made a huge blunder at move 39 and permanently blocked both ends of his own line with Andreas already ahead by one tile. Did anyone else see him write "Have the game, Andreas, ths one's on me" or was that just an illusion? ;-)

Bad jokes aside, there was some logic behind Kevin's move - firstly he wanted to stop Andreas for having any chance of completing the loop and secondly he thought there was still one GBG tile left in the bag. However, there were other ways to prevent the loop, eg. by playing his sixth tile on the bottom RH corner of the Tantrix, forcing in his top tile - that would have added two to his own line and his top tile was the last GYY tile, which Andreas would have needed at the bottom LH corner of the Tantrix in order to have any chance of completing the loop.

In time trouble, Kevin could not prevent Andreas from adding five more tiles to the open end of his line and Andreas eventually won the game by 25-19 to close the gap in the match to 54.2-45.8 TPs, meaning that Andreas will need a 3-tile win in the final game.

Another mad session was completed in unfortunate fashion as something went wrong with broadband access in the Wolverhampton area leaving Kevin unable to connect using either of his ISPs or even from his neighbour's house. Under the circumstances, it was only fair to give Andreas the choice of dates for the postponed game 6 and he chose Friday.

Forthcoming matches

The match between no. 11 seed Kevin Scott (GBR) and unseeded Andreas Kemerle (GER) will play the two remaining game of their R4 match on Friday 25 at 19.00 GMT / 20.00 BST / 21.00 CET. Andreas needs a 3-tile win. The three remaining QFs are likely to start towards the end of this week and dates and times will be posted when known.

Once I get the chance to write them, I will post the outstanding reports in order of when I write them to make it easy for you to know what is new on this page each day. I will then sort them back into chronological order (i.e. when the matches were actually played) a few days later.

Subjectivity: In reading these reports, do you think I'm not always 100% objective? (I do try to be, but I'm sure I don't always manage it!) Do you think I concentrate too much on the UK players or on my own section of the draw in these reports? (I know I do, because they are the players whose matches I am most inclined to watch, for obvious reasons) Are the reports sometimes inaccurate? (I write them VERY quickly, so I'm sure I miss plenty of things, but if you are reading this, you probably agree that quick, imperfect reports are better than none at all) Do you think I sometimes say things that are a bit controversial? Well, these reports would be (even more!) incredibly boring to read if they weren't a bit controversial sometimes. :-)

If you are at all concerned about any of the above, please note that players who feel like they have been unfairly treated always have the right to reply and I will always correct/remove anything I have written that turns out to be wrong or unfair or causes offence. You can also ask me not to make any comments on your matches apart from giving the scores if you like - I might even be quite relieved if you do!

If you want to redress the balance or just want more reports on players you are interested in, there is nothing to stop you contributing your own reports or setting up your own reports page. I am more than happy to link to other reports pages as long as, like me, you allow the right to reply and agree to correct/remove anything that a player takes reasonable objection to. The more reports pages the merrier. :-)

RESULTS FROM:

ROUNDS 4 TO THE FINAL


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