The American Go Association (AGA) and Candian Go Association (CGA) are seeking players interested in forming teams and traveling to Guangzhou, China, to compete in the second Jin Long Cheng World Team Go Championship from Dec. 15 to 23. The three players for the US team must be US citizens and be able to pay for their own travel and lodging (550 RMB per day) in Guangzhou; they may also bring a team official. Likewise, the Canadian team must comprise three Canadian citizens able to pay their own way. The tournament will include seeded teams from China, Korea, Japan and Taiwan, as well as three wild card teams from China, Japan and Korea. According to the China Qiyuan, teams from other countries are welcome as well. If more than nine teams register from the rest of the world including the US and Canada, then there will be a preliminary qualifying round to reduce the number to nine. (Teams eliminated at that phase will have a chance to participate in tourism, friendly matches with local players and other go activities.) The final group of up to 16 teams will compete in a five-round Swiss tournament, with the top four teams winning prizes up to 2 million RMB. Teams with no more than one pro player will be in competition for amateur team prizes of 100,000 RMB for winning three rounds, 50,000 RMB for winning two rounds and 30,000 RMB for winning one round. Players or already arranged teams should contact AGA President Andy Okun at president@usgo.org or CGA president James Sedgwick at james_sedgwick2003@yahoo.com by November 20. Given the short time line, preference will be given to already formed teams and to players who get in contact fastest.
