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Shikshin Narrowly Prevails Over Surin in Russian Cup Final

Dmitry Surin 6D came very close in his attempt to wrest the Russian Cup from favorite Ilya Shikshin on the final day of the 2013 Russian Go Congress on July 7. Surin, who unexpectedly won his game against Alexander Dinerchtein 3P in the semi-finals had defeated Shikshin in a recent tournament, so the match promised to be spectacular from the very start. As previously reported (Surin Bests Dinerchtein to Win Berth in Russian Cup Final 7/6/2013 EJ), Surin is an accomplished joseki expert and inventor, so it was no surprise when he started one of the myriad complicated variations of the taisha joseki. Both players stuck to their natural active fighting style, so the later part of the championship game delivered very intense collisions, an exciting clash lasting until the very end, with Shikshin eking out a narrow 1.5 point win. - Daria Koshkina, Russian corespondent for the E-Journal; photo by Mikail Krylov