In the beginning of February when the Jeongganjang Cup ended, Wang Rei, the head coach of the Chinese female national representative team, complained about the poor environment for Chinese female baduk in the interview with the China Youth Daily.

As Park Jieun 9p won 4 straight games, Korea won the Jeongganjang Cup. Hua Xueming 8p, the head coach of the Chinese representative team for the Nongshim Cup, said, "Something's gotta give for young players to grow."

When the 2^nd round ended, Yu Bin 9p, the general manager of the Chinese representative team for the Nongshim Cup, said, "Even though Korea is down to the only player, Park Jieun, it is still hard to guarantee China will win." Before the 3^rd round began, Wang Rei 8p has said, "A ring contest includes a lot of coincidence. One person can sometimes change the whole situation."

Head coach Wang Rei also said "Korea's Cho Hyeyeon didn't participate in this contest, but her ability is one of the best even in Korea. When I went to Korea to participate in the BC Card Cup World Baduk Championship, I purposefully had a close look at her games. The quality of her games was so great. If she and Park Jieun participate together in a ring test such as the Jeongganjang Cup, it is difficult to say China team is definitely superior. China did a good job in the last two contests after Korea won the Jeongganjang Cup twice. If Park Jieun wasn't in as good condition as this time, she must have lost to us."

He also added, "Cho Hyeyeon also came to cheer Korea team and she said the improvement of young Chinese female players was very burdening to Korean female players. A few years ago, young Chinese female players so young it took a lot of time and it was hard to catch up with Korea in a short period of time. Contrary to what people think, on the other hand, their improvement was made very quickly and it was because of the strong points of the beneficial system of Chinese Baduk. Cho Hyeyeon also said she was envious of Chinese female players being able to play games against top players organized by their head coach with male players support because it is not usually possible to face such top players except for the occasional encounter with Lee Changho or Lee Sedol."

According to Wang Rei 8p's introduction, the speed of Chinese young female players' improvement is so fast Korea is carrying out benchmarking. He said, "the Korea Baduk Association has already organized training for 20 backup national team, the head coach job is taken by one of male players and he brings top players to study Baduk together with them and this is a new attempt to them. We will find out about the effect when we watch the Asian Games in this year."

The Asian Games are scheduled in October and Baduk has been included in the regular events in the Asian Games in this year for the first time. Three gold medals will be awarded in the baduk events including the men's team event, the women's team event and the coed team event in the Asian Games in this year. Since players are allowed to participate in two or more events, China is planning to call up 6 male players and 4 female players.

Liu Si Ming, the chairman of the Chinese Baduk Association, said, "What the Chinese team is aiming for is to make sure of winning 1 gold medal and then compete for the remaining 2 gold medals. The Asian Games are the biggest event the Chinese sport world holds the earliest in this year and our goal is to defeat the Korean team and win the gold medal for the women's team event.

If Guangzhou Asian Games were not held in this year, Chinese female players would not have any important tournaments to participate in after the 8^th Jeongganjang Cup finished. As of now, there are not many baduk tournaments for women and it is rare for sponsor companies to sponsor female tournaments, which is becoming a big obstacle for the improvement of female baduk.

One of the strong points of the representative team system is to foster players to be competent in a short period of time. On the other hand, it is important to combine the improvement of female players to the tournament market in order to guarantee the continuous improvement of female baduk. As of now, there are only two tournaments female players can participate in including the Jianqiao Cup and the Bailing Cup for a year and the remaining tournaments are the National Baduk Individual Tournament and the dan-ranking tournament. There is no way to compare them to tournaments for male players in terms of the number as well as the scale and the prize money.

Describing female players' income as indescribable, Wang Rei 8p said, "the champion prize for winning Jianqiao Cup is 150,000 Yuan, which is the largest amount. It is very difficult for most female players to survive."

"The Chinese Jia League that has already been established plays a role to guarantee male players good income but a league like this is a prize beyond their reach. Some say female players should be included in the league but it is not a good solution."

"As of now, the total number of Chinese female representative players is 10. The oldest player is 25 years old and the youngest 18 years old. I hope they have more opportunities to participate in more tournaments. The mission of the national representative team is to make good results. On the other hand, if female baduk is not propagated well and it doesn't have good future, even if they make good results, their contribution to our society is not that big."

Head coach Wang Rei's concern is not limited to Chinese baduk world's problem. In terms of Korean female baduk as well, there are three tournaments in Korea for women including the Female Myungin Tournament, the Female Guksu Tournament and the Female Kisung Tournament when excluding the Jeongganjang Cup that is an international ring contest. On top of it, there is discussion going on to change the Female Kisung Tournament to hold it in every second year and this the actual situation of female baduk players in Korea.

- Kyungdong Kim, Cyberoro.com