LG Cup is an influential international competition. Like many in-person Go competitions, it has been affected by the Corona Virus Pandemic. The 25th edition was recently concluded with the unfancied Shin Minjun winning over the highly regarded Ke Jie. By doing so, Shin crushed Ke's dream of becoming the youngest player with nine international titles. Ke currently holds eight international titles, the most by far for players of his generation. There is a significant change coming to the LG Cup. The tournament organizer will slash eight spots from the main competition and reduce the number of places to 24 from 32. Also, there will not be seeded players, so that all pairings will be random. The winner's purse is 300 million won while the losing finalist will receive 100 million won. Because of the Coronavirus pandemic, there will not be a centralized preliminary tournament. However, the preliminary tournament will be held separately with the following allocation of qualifying spots: Korea 7, China 4, Japan 1. Also, there will be fixed allocated places for Korea 4, China 2, Japan 2, Chinese Taipei 1 and Finalist of the 25th edition, Shin Minjun and Ke Jie. LG Cup will take places on 30, 31 of May (round of 24) and 1, 2 of Jun (round of 16) 7, 8 of November (round of 8) 9, 10 of November (semi-final) 7-10 of February 2022 (final; best of 3) The time control is 1 hour and 5 times 40 second byo-yomi
