After six hectic rounds Caribbean Scrabble Champion Frederick Collins emerged winner of the Guyana Scrabble Association (GSA) Emancipation Day Open Scrabble tournament played on Monday at the Malteenoes Sports Club.
Collins ploughed his way through the opposition to emerge with five and a half games and a positive spread of 499 points.
James Krakowsky amassed four games and a positive spread of 233 to place second while former amateur boxer Julian Skeete, with four games and a positive spread of 144, placed third.
Collins took the tournament by storm crushing Michael Benjamin in his first round encounter which saw him gain 162 points.
He then added 48 more points from his game against Moen Gafoor.
Wins against Grace Hercules (44), Orlando Michael (64) and Krakowsky (181) helped pave Collins’s path to the top spot.
He, however, missed his chance at a clean sweep of all six rounds when he was bottlenecked with a draw in his final round clash with Ulric Harris. Krakowsky started out on the negative side when he lost his opening game against Rudolph Michael.
But he redeemed himself with wins in his next three games against Kamita Ramnarine (25), Maurice Munroe (15) and Moen Gafoor (17). After suffering a defeat in his penultimate game against Collins, Krakowsky made a massive comeback when he gained 356 points from his win against Michael in his final game to snatch the second spot. Skeete scored his first two wins against Harris and Munroe respectively gaining 20 points each in the process. But suffered losses to Michael (55) and Hercules (5). He, however, bounced back with wins against Benjamin (162) and Gafoor (62), to secure third place.
The top three received prizes from president of the GSA Moen Gafoor at the end of the tournament.
Gafoor disclosed that that the association will now turn its attention to the Junior Scrabble contest for students scheduled for August 21.
The tournament is open to students between the ages of 11 and 18-years-old and will comprise four rounds, each lasting about an hour with a 30-minute break between the first two rounds. Gafoor stressed that due to the limited number of boards; the GSA will limit the number of registrants to 30 individuals and is urging interested persons to register early for obvious reasons. Registrants are asked to submit their name, telephone number and e-mail address if they have one.
Registration is expected to close off on the 18th of August and participants must bring their school badges to compete.
Interested persons can register by calling the following telephone numbers: 600-2870, 621-8176, 623-9568.
