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2009 King's Cup Commentary: Round 26

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Go to: Before the Tournament, Round 1, Round 2, Round 3, Round 4, Round 5, Round 6, Round 7, Round 8, Round 9, Round 10, Round 11, Round 12, Round 13, Round 14, Round 15, Round 17, Round 18, Round 19, Round 20, Round 21, Round 22, Round 23, Round 24, Round 25, Round 26, Round 27, Final Round 1, Final Round 2, Final Round 3, After the Tournament.

Charnwit Sukhumrattanaporn (THA) is Gibsonized vs. Thacha Koowirat (THA), whom he beats 429-332 to reach a 22-4 +1596 record. Pakorn Nemitrmansuk (THA) plays Jason Katz-Brown (USA) for a fourth time in the unlimited KOTH format, and narrowly beats him 459-450 for a second time, evening their own series record at two games apiece. This means they'll play one last time next time, but the winnner is not guaranteed to play in the finals.

The second finalist will be the highest player at 19-8, which could be Pakorn, Jason, or Nigel Richards (NZL), who at 18-8 is playing Siu Hean Cheah (SGP) at Board 2. Their spreads are respectively +1404, +1291 and +1246, so Nigel has to win big, while Pakorn or Jason can either win by a reasonable amount and have Nigel not win big, or have a narrow win and hope that Nigel loses.

Most of this round's Director's calls have had to do with three-piece paper insert tiles disassembling themselves within the tile bag; it looks like this collection of tiles may be reaching the end of their lifespan, after four days of vigorous shaking and slapping down on the board.

At Amnuay Ploysangngam's (THA) request, I start pairing the KOTH field from the bottom so that they can start playing without waiting for the last game, which will be Board 1, by at least ten minutes again. It's hard work tearing away the huge crowd of kibitzers from the top board. I promise them all that their own games will be much more exciting, but no one wants to leave until they see who wins.

Congratulations to Apirat Choomai (THA) on clinching the 10,000 baht Handicap prize with one round to go. The handicap prize is based on total number of wins, doubled, plus a handicap bonus determined for each player by a staff handicapper.