At 2:30 AM Minnesota time, the Fall Grand Sumo Tournament will begin. I will be keeping up with the twists and turns of the sumo tournament over the next 15 days (the length of the tournament.)

This time, there will be a few interesting things to watch for:

1) Will Yokozuna Asashoryu continue his streak of consecutive tournament victories?  (If memory serves me, he has won the previous four tournaments.

2) Will Ozeki Tochiazuma (now that his injuries have healed) continue on his path toward Yokozuna, or will he stall at the Ozeki rank?

3) Finally, how will number-one Maegashira Kokkai do?  Georgian rikishi Kokkai is entering his first tournament ranked at Maegashira number one.  If he has a successful tournament, he will have the opportunity to rise into the Sanyaku(champion level.)

The number-one Maegashira usually faces really stiff competition for the duration of the tournament.  Kokkai, who has never had a losing tournament in the upper-division, will be put to his strongest test in this tournament.

My prediction:  As usual Kokkai will start out strong,  and then lose a few matches in the second week.  I predict that he'll finish the tournament with a record of 9 wins: 6 losses.

Rikishi Kokkai: