Latest revision as of 12:23, 22 August 2023

The World SCRABBLE® Championship (WSC) was the world’s top international Scrabble championship tournament. Although it ceased to be held under this name in 2011, this page also lists its successor events, which continue to fill the same role within the global competitive Scrabble community.

The tournament rules and word list for current events are set by the World English-Language Scrabble Players Association (WESPA). The direct involvement of NASPA is limited to selecting the American and Canadian teams.

For more information about the most recent event, see 2023 WESPA Championship.

History

The first WSC was organized by Philip Nelkon of Mattel in London in 1991 and won by Peter Morris, a Canadian residing in the United States, who defeated American Brian Cappelletto in a best-of-three finals. It was conceived as an invitational event to showcase the best players in the world for publicity purposes, and to let the players experience the highest level competition on the way to determining the world champion.

Two years later in 1993, the National SCRABBLE Association under John D. Williams, Jr. organized the next event, sponsored by Hasbro and directed by Michael R. Wise in New York City. It was won by Mark Nyman of England.

From then until 2003, the WSC was organized and sponsored in biennial alternation by Williams & Hasbro and Nelkon & Mattel, during which period Americans and Canadians won two more titles each, and and Thailand one.

From 2005 to 2011, Hasbro declined to sponsor the event, so it was organized and sponsored by Nelkon and Mattel.

In 2013 (Prague, Czechoslovakia) and 2014 (London, U.K.), Mattel licensed Mind Sports International (MSI) to hold an open Scrabble Champions Tournament in place of the traditionally invitational WSC.

This met with opposition from players, because the open format eliminated the cachet of being selected to represent one’s country, and might dilute the strength of the playing field. There was also objection in 2014 to the new annual schedule, which disrupted traditional funding models that players had used for travelling to the championship in alternate years.

MSI continued to support the annual, open format however, because it could result in greater entry-fee revenues.

In 2015, Mattel withdrew support for MSI’s SCRABBLE Champions Tournament, and WESPA staged instead their first WESPA Championship, returning to the invitational format. Although WESPA was (and as of 2023 still is) the officially licensed governing body for international Scrabble, they were denied the right to use “World Scrabble Championship” branding. WESPA and NASPA therefore consider this and subsequent WESPA Championships to be world championships (lower-case) of Scrabble, while formally recognizing the ongoing right of Mattel or Hasbro to name anyone a World Scrabble Champion, and providing WESPA’s rating services to event organizers.

In 2016, MSI held what was initially billed as the “MSI World Championships” in Lille, France, and subsequently upgraded to the “MSI World Scrabble Championship” under license from Mattel. WESPA did not hold an event, because it was an even year.

In 2017, MSI staged a Mattel-licensed a “MSI World Scrabble Championship” originally announced for Doha (Qatar) but subsequently relocated to Nottingham (U.K.). MSI declared insolvency on 2017-11-02 owing more than £160,000 to creditors in Rhode Island, Lille, Nottingham, and Doha, and its director repurposed another company to stage future events. The WESPA Championship was organized by national governing body Scrabble Kenya in Nairobi, Kenya.

In 2018, TMA International (formerly known as DB Subscriptions Ltd), doing business as Mindsports Academy, staged the “Mattel World Scrabble Championships” in Torquay, U.K. WESPA did not hold an event, because it was an even year.

In 2019, Mindsports Academy held another “Mattel World Scrabble Championship” in Torquay. The WESPA Championship was organized by national governing body Scrabble Association of India in Goa, India.

No championships were held in 2020 or 2022 due to the global COVID-19 pandemic.

In 2021, national governing body Pakistan Scrabble Association staged an unrated virtual event under the name “Gladiators WESPA Championship 2021” on woogles.io. Despite the official WESPA branding, the different nature of online play and its lack of official rating leave the 2021 winner, Alastair Richards, with the title of virtual world champion.

In 2023, binational governing body NASPA returned the event to online play with the WESPA Championship 2023 in Las Vegas, NV.

Details of some events follow, others will be added as time permits.

2016 MSI World Scrabble Championship

• This was the first event held in France.
• This was the first event to be held together with the French World Championship.

2015 WESPA Championship

• This was the first event to feature best-of-7 finals.
• This was the first event won by an African.

2014 SCRABBLE Champions Tournament

• This was the first event held in an even-numbered year.
• This was the first event to feature quarterfinals.

2013 SCRABBLE Champions Tournament

• Nigel Richards became the first player to win the title for a third time.
• Nigel Richards became the first champion to successfully defend the title.
• This was the first event in this series organized by MSI.
• This was the first event in this series to be called the SCRABBLE Champions Tournament.
• This was the first event in this series to include a Last Chance Qualifier.
• This was the first event in this series to include official side events: Clabbers, Duplicate, Speed, three Opens, Czech, German, Norwegian and Polish.

2011 World SCRABBLE Championship

• Nigel Richards became the first two-time champion.
• In Round 7, Edward Martin and Chollapat Itthi-Aree discovered that a “G” tile was missing from their game. The incident was widely reported in the news media, but the tile was eventually found later on in the event under innocuous circumstances.
• First event to be held under WESPA rules (Version 2)

2009 World SCRABBLE Championship

• First event to be held under WESPA rules (Version 1)

2007 World SCRABBLE Championship

2005 World SCRABBLE Championship

2003

• Information to follow

2001

• Information to follow

1999

• Information to follow

1997

• Information to follow

1995

• Information to follow

1993

• Information to follow

1991

• Information to follow

See Also

• WESPA’s list of winners