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Nigeria maintains leadership position in scrable
Written by Patrick Omorodion, Nairobi
Saturday, 11 October 2008
Today marks the second day of the 8th Pan African Scrabble Championship holding in Nairobi, Kenya with Nigeria parading the best players in the continent who are not in any hurry to relinquish leadership of the sport in the continent.
Yar Adua
In the last two editions, Dennis Ikekeregor bestrode the venue of the championship like a giant even though his is of a pint size, courtesy of his word power. But this year, he looks vulnerable especially after the 2nd Akpabio International Scrabble Championship which ended in Uyo, capital of Akwa Ibom State on Sunday.
At the Uyo event Ikekeregor, Africa’s reigning champion was humbled by a hitherto unsung player, Emmanuel Umujose who beat all comers to emerge tops while current world number three, Wellington Jighere settled for third position.
Umujose’s feat shocked all, not the least the national coach, Akintnde Akinsemola who described the Akpabio Classics as the best thing to have happened to Nigerian scrabble in recent time. “This is the best thing to happen to Nigerian scrabble in a very, very long time. I am happy with the results and standard of play. It all goes to show that there is a bright future for Nigerian scrabble,” he told brilafm.net.
Akinsemola is not alone in this thought as Terry Kirk, Chairman of the Association of British Scrabble Players (ABSP) who attended the Uyo championship told NigeriaScrabble.com that Nigeria has a strong reservoir of scrabble players who could stand any opposition from other parts of the world.
Stressing that the standard of the sport in Nigeria is very high, Kirk said “I was warned before I came here by Nigerian players based in the UK that the standard is high. This weekend (last week in Uyo) I’ve won only 3 games out of 13! In the UK, I’m one of the top 20 players, so that shows how high the standard is.”
President of the Nigeria Scrabble Federation (NSF), Chief Toke Aka is basking in the euphoria of the strength of the Nigerian team to hold on to the continent’s title once again and judging by the array of players in the team to Kenya, the optimism is not misplaced.
In the team are, current rave of the moment, Umujose, Ikekeregor who will try to retain the title he defended in Abuja last year and Jighere who would want to confirm his rating as the current world’s number three player.
Other players Chief Aka is proud to present at the Kenya championship are Moses Peter, Ibukun Faloye, Ayorinde Saidu, Chinedu Okwelogu and Eta Karo. Not even the Kenyan maestro, Joash Manyasa could stop these players.
Two years ago in Abuja, only Ghana’s representative, Micky Quao was able to break into the top 10 of winners, placing fourth. But this year, he will not be able to rekindle his feat as he would not be in Kenya for the event. With Quao out, Nigeria which is exhibiting quite an interesting form are up for a good outing.
Registration and draw for the Kenya event was done on Wednesday while competition proper started yesterday at the Kasarani Sports Complex. According to Manyasa seven games were lined up for day one, that was yesterday while today, nine games will be decided with eight games (King of the Hill) will be decided tomorrow to draw the curtains for the 2008 championship.
To maintain their stronghold of the sport in Africa and better their performance at world championships, the British scrabble boss recommended that “ Maybe you need greater experience, more players coming over to UK and outside your country for Scrabble tournaments”.
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