THE WORLD OF COMPETITION SCRABBLE – AUGUST
What an amazing month and a bit in the world of Scrabble! Since the last report, the World has crowned two new Champions, the global scene has converged on Europe and there have been tournaments on four continents that all caught the eye of every keen competitive Scrabble fan and player.
We will start in Asia. Before August, Malaysia held its National Championships with the Masters Division won by Gan Yi En. Chang Ching Wei's 605 the high game for this event.
Heading into August, and on to Singapore: the Scrabble Shootout, Singapore (SSSg) is the annual knockout tournament for Scrabble rated by the Scrabble Association, Singapore and is keenly fought. The results are published for all to see, including boards of every game played! Players interested in seeing what the best players in Singapore have to offer, the Facebook page SSSg has been set up for easy to follow access to games and analysis.
August/September has also seen the Jurong Green CC School Scrabble Championship completed. Reports on this will be included in our next feature.
Heading to Israel, and to Kadima which saw a win to Evan Cohen. For players interested in playing in a WESPA rated tournament in Israel, the next one is on in February 2017.
Some history was created in Australian tournaments this past month as well. There was a tight win to Australia over traditional rivals (in just about anything) New Zealand in the Trans Tasman Scrabble Championship, which saw the individual title taken by Alastair Richards with NZ's Lyres Freeth runner up. Later in August, the highest score in an Australian tournament this year was played out in South Australia. Michael Cameron's 722 is the 5th highest score in Australia of all time and was the standout score in an Adelaide tournament.
Up until now, the last female to win a National tournament (either to be Australian Scrabble Champion or win the Australian Masters) in Australia was in 1995 when Joan Rosenthal was victorious. After the last weekend, this changed with the holding of the 2016 Australian Masters and State Team Challenge (AMSTC) in Victoria.
The AMSTC is a round robin tournament featuring the top 20 Australian players who qualify for the event with a team event featuring the 6 states and the ACT run simulatenously. The event was tight and came down to the final game on Sunday afternoon to determine the winners of each Division. Andrew Fisher's CORRIDA outplay gave him a 15pt win over Alastair Richards in a 1003 point game, meaning that if Joanne Craig defeated Russell Honeybun, she would win and Alastair would come second.
Joanne Craig emerged victorious in the final game, making her the 2016 Australian Masters Champion (usually earning the winner a qualifying spot in WESPAC 2017). Western Australia beat out Victoria and the other states to win the State Team Challenge!
Another Australian was in action across the other side of the globe in August...and emerged victorious.
The 2016 North American Scrabble Championship is the biggest event on the North American calendar with divisions for both TWL and Collins wordlists. This year, it was held in Fort Wayne, Indiana and featured hundreds of players in action to take out the accolades on offer.
Keen followers on social media would have followed the NASPA footage on both Facebook and Twitter and were able to see David Gibson win the main event in TWL.
Those interested in the Collins Division were treated to an amazing match which gave Australia's David Eldar the title! You can watch the game here.
The streamed coverage featured the commentary team of Jesse Matthews and Robin Pollock Daniel: they would pair up again for the MSI World Championships in Lille about three weeks later.
Players wanting to get some practice in for Lille were able to get some high quality Scrabble in the UK before heading across the Channel at the end of August.
Early in August, a field featuring Brett Smitheram and Lewis Mackay featured at the Ilford Open which was won by Rik Kennedy winning 7 of 8 games.
Closer to Lille, one of the flagship events was played out in Sutton Bonington: The British Matchplay Scrabble Championship. There were three events: the Early Bird (which was won by Rob Robinsky), the Extra (won by John Ashmore) and the Main Event.
The Main Event featured 25 gruelling games and included international players such as the 2014 SCT runner-up Chris Lipe and Dave Koenig amongst an already strong field. Allan Simmons emerged triumphant from Rob Robinsky and Lewis Mackay. Rob's games were on his Instagram account and Dave is a prominent tweeter of games.
This ensured, along with the British Scrabble Facebook page photos, that keen followers of global Scrabble had their interest maintained in what was already a huge month of Scrabble.
It culminated in a festival of international Scrabble that was the MSI World Championships, held at the Grand Palais in Lille.
The first event for English language Scrabble was the 11th World Youth Scrabble Championship and featured over 100 players showcasing the future of the Scrabble scene.
You can see samples of the social media coverage for Day 1, Day 2, and Day 3 of this amazing event that was won by the UAE's Sanchit Kapoor! Sri Lanka's Scrabble performance was acknowledged on Twitter by none other than their former cricket captain Mahela Jayawardena! Pakistan's team was widely acknowledged for its quality and performance.
The main event social media coverage for Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, and the historic final day which featured a comprehensive victory to the UK's Brett Smitheram. His play of BRACONID in the third game (prob 7732) was the standout noticed play by media (and entomologists) the world over. You can see all the official media coverage of the event here and view some of the photos on the official Scrabble Facebook page here.
The B Division was won by Nigeria's Mpakboari Jack, a victory celebrated on Facebook by the Nigerian Scrabble Federation. The Sunday tournament had an Australian connection, with Karen Richards appropriately winning the final tournament of the Championships having been such a pivotal and important role in the tournament that started it all (WYSC).
This brings to an end our coverage for the past month. Our September report will look at the events in Vienna and take a look to what is on offer for 2017.
Until then, Happy Scrabbling.