Big Clash! bigbadwolf vs. RustySword

Today there was a big clash between two very well known players on KGS, bigbadwolf (Andy Liu) and Rustysword (Oh Chi-Min). They have not played each other many times before. The record since the beginning of the year, counting this game, is 2-1 in favor of bigbadwolf.

The game started off on an interesting note as Black played an approach inside White's nirensei, which is relatively rare. Next, Black tenukis White's approach at White 16 and plays an approach to White's lower left corner. Next, Black adopts an interesting stragety to counter White's moves on the left. Black 23, 25, 27 created a large, but very open framework on the bottom. Then when White wedged in with 28, Black ignored to take 3-3 in the lower left, a very perplexing stragety. After White 29, White is more or less stabilized and Black's previous wall seems under attack. After Black jumps into White's left side with 30 to attack White's two lower left stones, there follows a series of short local sequences, which by White 66, the picture is clear. White's center vs. Black's territory.

Black invades with 67. In response, White tries to lean on Black's upper right corner with 68, but Black ignores and leaps away with 69. With the result up White 86, Black had connected easily with no apparent damage. Many felt the game was going in Black's favor. This feeling was increased by White's seeming misread at 104. However, Black made a significant misread at 151, carelessly miscounting. Black suffers a big defeat there. Black 183 perhaps is a misread, in any case, it leads to an exchange, where White sacrifices 8 stones to grab a big center. I am not sure for who this exchange is better. In the following yose, Black has no chances and White wins by 7.5.