Controversy has rocked the World Scrabble Championships in Milton Keynes this week. In the final game between Gary O'Lean and Petra Olium, Olium thought she was on a winner, knowing her opponent was left with a K, W and F, and she was a little over sixty points in front.
"I figured I could take it easy," said Olium. "I didn't see any way he could play out with the letters he had left. Not in one go anyway. I had two words to play, and places to put them both. I thought I'd won. I should have won. Gaz's word shouldn't have been allowed, he's only fourteen."
Olium played a tactical word, ensuring O'Lean could not easily play his K, without realising that she had left a C unchaperoned down the right hand side of the board. After a moment's thought, O'Lean triumphantly played 'fuckwits' across two triple words, with the K on a double letter, making 'frigging' onto the word 'rigging' and 'twats' onto the word 'wats'. This was worth three hundred and twenty-five points, winning not only the game, but the highest scoring word of the tournament, beating 'quartz' played by Olium in the first round.
"I don't see what her problem is," said O'Lean. "They're all allowable words. I was a bit fortuitous that the letters were available. It's not like I was playing my gran. My gran won't play me. She reckons I cheat because I make sure we use my OSW. I mean, like, her dictionary don't have television in it, it's that old. She shouldn't have left the C open, she knew I had a K. Duh."
O'Lean's gran was in the audience to see her grandson lift the title of World Scrabble player of the year. She seemed unfazed by his choice of winning word.
"He's great at Scrabble, isn't he?" said grandmother, Pauline O'Lean, "I've got no fucking clue where he's picked up all the sodding language though."
