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On the 18-19th November, Richard played in the A division of the ABSP Winter Matchplay held in Milton Keynes.  Here is his report :

 

The Winter Matchplay is an annual two day event played in the centre of Milton Keynes over a weekend in November.
 
The event is split into 3 divisions and there were 64 players in all. I was the one East Berks player involved and played in Division A.
 
I won the first game well but in game 2 I faced one of the top players and lost by a whopping 350 points with the opponent scoring 624, playing 5 bonuses and getting 70 odd for a Z play!
 
Although I was one of the lowest rated players in a strong division I had hoped to better the tally of 6 wins from 17. I did lose one game by a single point and had my first experience of going for a full recount which you can opt to do in a close game. I hadn't realised though that it involved checking all of the word scores on the board -not just the addition. This took a long time and it meant everyone was delayed playing their final round! . Also, unfortunately for me the scores were found to be correct!
 
However, I still enjoyed playing in the tournament and will no doubt play there again next year.
 
A selection of my favourite bonuses played by me and against me are as follows;
 
Me - EPIGEAN, LABIATE, UNNAILED, ORGASMED, TRAVELOG, DENOTIVE, REVOICES, SANTOUR, ORDNANCE, ASTATIDE (9X 122)
Opponents- RANULAR, DETRITAL, MIKVOTH(!), UNISONS, MISVALUE, NORITIC, GENTOOS, REMIGIAL

 

Well done Richard - some very tough competition in deed.

 

Here is one of his boards.

 

 

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In the first few days in November, Fiona played in 2 scrabble tournaments in Malta - here is her report - thank you Fiona!

 

The Malta Scrabble club hosts an annual tournament which is attended by players from all over the world.  I thought that some November sun, combined with Scrabble sounded much nicer than rain in Blackwater!   There were a number of tournaments – I attended the one day early bird, and the main three day event.  !  I was joined by a countdown friend, Tom, for the early bird – it was Tom’s first tournament and he’d spent the plane journey learning the 2 letter words!   I played people from England, Scotland, Ireland, Malta, Australia and India, and lots of other countries were represented too  – a truly international event

The warmup day didn’t go particularly well Scrabble-wise, but I played some lovely people and won 2 of my 9 games.   The main tournament was 25 games, and I won 10, but many of the games were very close and I finished with a positive spread which I think is a tournament first for me!  I also got my highest tournament score of 549, and averaged 392 points per game so despite the low win rate I was happy enough with how I’d played.  

Over 34 games there were lots of bonuses!   My favourites were SUIVANTE and DEADEYES, and my highest scoring bonus was ADJOINS for 117 points.  Others included DRACONES, MONIKER, TRITONE, SEAMIEST, ROTARIES, BLEMISH, TALENTED, UNREADY, HOARSER, RURALIST (twice!), TILLERS, SALLIES, TERRIES, MEALIER, MENDINGS, CURRANTS, INSOFAR, ROISTER, RUSTLING, SONNETS, SAURIAN, WEDGIES, UNSTAGED, RELISTS, STUNNERS, LISTENER, DETAILS, STOUTLY, AVIATED, IONISING, EGOTISE, SERRATE, ENTITLES, PEASANT, FAIRIES, OUTLIER, ABIDING

There was a 5 point per word penalty for challenges, so a lot of invalid words stayed on the board.  5 points shouldn’t be too much of a deterrent, but I did have one game where my unsuccessful challenge swung the game to my opponent!

 

The hotel was lovely, and there was a small sandy beach nearby which was deserted at sunrise.  The sea was the perfect temperature for a swim!  The Malta Scrabble club had arranged a meal out and a tourist day, and those were a lot of fun too.   I’d definitely recommend it if you fancy some winter sunshine!