U.K. SCRABBLE SOCIETY BANS STAR PLAYER FOR BREAKING RULES

The Association of British Scrabble players banned one of its star players for three years after an independent investigation concluded that he had broken rules in the popular word game. A committee member for the association, Elie Dangoor, said Monday that three independent witnesses saw Allan Simmons, who has authored books on Scrabble, put a hand with freshly drawn letter tiles back into a bag to draw more tiles — contrary to the rules. “The natural conclusion had been that he had been cheating,” Dangoor said. There were four instances dating back to 2016, and the committee conducted an independent probe. Simmons told the Times of London he denied cheating, and that he had suffered the same “untimely bad luck from the bag as anyone else.”