Renju Team World Championship

The Renju World Team Championships ended in Tokyo. 8 teams participated. Estonia 1, Estonia 2, Japan 1, Japan 2, Russia, China, Taiwan and, with special permission from the International Renju Federation, a joint team of Ukraine and Azerbaijan. Estonia was able to field 2 teams due to the fact that they are the reigning world champions and Japan is the host country. The favorites were Japan 1, competing at home with its best team, in addition to China, Russia and Estonia 1. The 8 teams first played each other in a round-robin system and then in foursomes for 1st-4th and 5th-8th places, with only the points from the foursomes' games between them being taken into account from the preliminary round. Estonia 1 played with (in order of boards) - Tunnet Taimla, Aivo Oll, Andry Purk and Ants Soosõrv. Estonia 2 - Paul Väljataga, Madli Mirme, Martin Hõbemägi and Alvar Timmermann. Preliminary tournament results: 1. Japan 1 19 2. Estonia 1 19 3. China 19 4. Taiwan 18.5 5. Japan 2 14.5 6. Russia 12.5 7. Estonia 2 5.5 8. Ukraine/Azerbaijan 4 In the first round of the final, Estonia 1 lost to China 1.5:2.5. Japan 1 defeated Taiwan 3.5:0.5. In the second round, Estonia defeated Taiwan 4:0 and China defeated Japan 2.5:1.5. In the last round, China quickly defeated Taiwan 3.5:0.5. Estonia now needed to defeat Japan 1 at least 3:1 to take first place. Meanwhile, it seemed that Estonia could win by as much as 3.5:0.5, but unfortunately the final score was still 2.5:1.5 Results: 1. China 14 match points 4 2. Estonia 1 14 3.5 3. Japan 13.5 4. Taiwan 6.5 Second four: 5. Russia 18 6. Japan 2 14.5 7. Estonia 10.5 8. Ukraine 4 In the results of the first board, Tunnet Taimla shared 1st place with Chinese Li Yi with 7.5 points out of 10.

Congratulations from me! You have proven once again that Estonia is a great Renju country :)

Thank you Tiit! We are trying to be worthy of Estonian sudoku stars :)