Tanguy Le Calvé 1p, France

The European Professional System was established in 2014. The only way to become a professional player in Europe is through winning a professional qualification tournament. Here are the current European professionals in order by when they turned pro:

• • 2014: Pavol Lisy (Slovakia) and Ali Jabarin (Israel)
  • 2015: Mateusz Surma (Poland) and Ilya Shikshin (Russia)
  • 2016: Artem Kachanovskyi (Ukraine)
  • 2017: Andrii Kravets (Ukraine)

Since 2017, The Pro Qualification is held once every two years. The 5th European Pro Qualification tournament was held in Strasbourg (France) on May 16–19, 2019. 16 players competed in a special double-elimination system. Tournament table, game records and all the other details you can find at the tournament webpage.
The winner was Tanguy Le Calvé from France. He started the tournament as the 6th player by rating, and in the second round he lost to Stanislaw Frejlak from Poland. After that he won all of the remaining games. In the final he defeated Lukas Podpera from Czechia by 3.5 points.
For more information, please see the articles on the European Go Federation website:

• • Round 1
  • Rounds 2 and 3
  • Quarter- and semifinals
  • Final game
  • Interview with the new Pro

The next Pro Qualification will take place in 2021.

Report by Artem