Scrabble champion wins fourth world title with a groutier finish

A MISERABLE word has helped put a smile on the face of a Scrabble champion as he won his fourth world title.

As Scrabble fans marked 70 years of the board game, New Zealander Nigel Richards, 51, clinched victory in London when he played the word “groutier”.

The crucial word, which is derived from “grouty”, meaning cross, sulky or sullen, scored 68 points, giving Mr Richards the winning 575-point score over Californian Jesse Day with 452.

After his win at the championships, held at the Westfield shopping centre in Shepherd’s Bush, Mr Richards said: “I am absolutely thrilled to have won two world championships this year, including the French and English. It was a closely-fought championship and Jesse was a very impressive opponent to play.” The words “zonular”, which was worth 100 points and means “like a zone”, and “phenolic”, which scored 84 points and means “a synthetic resin” were among the highest-scoring words played by Mr Richards in the final.

Mr Day played the other highestscoring word when he used “maledict”, meaning “utter a curse against”, to score 95 points.

Malaysia-based Mr Richards began playing Scrabble in 1995. He won his three previous World Scrabble Championship titles in 2007, 2011 and 2013, and also won the French World Championship in 2015.

Mr Day, a 31-year-old data scientist, said playing against Mr Richards “was an extraordinary privilege” and described him as “the greatest there has ever been and ever will be”. He added: “This is the closest I can create to art. I started playing in my final year of high school and just got addicted.”

Mr Richards does not speak French but won the francophone tournament after learning the French Scrabble dictionary by heart.