There were high scores for “acuities”, “valerian” and “sporidia” on the day, but in the end it was “skitter”, played for 81 points on a double word score, that proved decisive.

Paul Allan, a former international decathlete, was crowned British Scrabble Champion yesterday, after a prodigious show of wordplay that probed the more obscure backwaters of the English lexicon.

Mr Allan, the favourite, beat Stewart Holden 462-366 in the last game to win the national championship final 3-1 at the Cavendish Conference Centre in London.

Amassing a total score of 1,908 points, words from Mr Allan’s repertoire on the day included “bum”, “fatwa” and, rather appropriately, “genii”.

In a show of emotion not normally associated with the game, his final word was “ai”, which has an English meaning (a three-toed sloth from South America) but also means “love” in Japanese. This he dedicated to his Japanese wife.

After his victory, Mr Allan admitted that he had “lost the plot” as the pressure mounted. “I was relieved to win in the end, I got so nervous,” he said. “I got some lucky tiles.”

As the final was played out in a darkened room to whispers and the hum of computers, 200 Scrabble enthusiasts loudly debated the players’ every move in a nearby auditorium. Words such as “otitis” — an inflammation of the ear — received rapturous applause because it was judged to be the optimum play at the time. Such strategic appreciation meant that some high-scoring words — such as “queering”, played on a triple word score for 104 — received less applause than “hoot” because the latter was judged a better tactical move. Mistakes were greeted with groans and knowing looks.

Mr Allan, 37, turned to Scrabble after a shoulder injury ended his athletics career. He takes his victory to the world championships in India next month, representing Scotland.

“Playing under cameras and under this pressure was good practice for the world championships,” he said. “The £1,000 prize money will pay for my trip over there.”

The audience was also treated to the sometimes baffling commentary from Mark Nyman, Britain’s only previous world champion, and four-time national champion. “I like Cs,” he told an appreciative audience. “Cs are very underestimated in the game.”

The onlookers were a surprisingly young crowd, perhaps reflecting a renaissance in the game thanks to Facebook, the social networking website, which has allowed more than 300,000 people to play the game against friends online.

Phillip Nelkon, organiser of the event, said: “It’s not a fuddy-duddy’s game any more. All the top players are under 40.”

Other highlights of the day included the appearance of Austin Shin, a student competing in the National Schools Scrabble Championship, being held alongside the adult final for the first time. He scored a huge 613 score in one match, bettering scores achieved by the adult finalists.

There are an estimated 1,000 competitive Scrabble players in the country, with 50,000 worldwide. Britain is one of the strongest nations in the game, with the US, Canada, Australia and Thailand also feared on the international stage.

The beaten finalist, Mr Holden, 28, had to win his last eight games in the semi-final to reach yesterday’s final and was just happy to play at the event. “You can’t cram last minute for this,” he said. “You either know it or you don’t.”

Double word score and the ultimate question

— The highest number of points that can be scored on the first go is 128 — with MUZJIKS (Russian peasants)

— The Dutch gave us the generic word Scrabble — schrabbelan means to claw or scrape

— Karl Khoshnaw, from Manchester, holds the record for the highest word score in a competition, scoring 392 points with CAZIQUES— the plural for a West Indian chief

— Scrabble is used in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams, to decide the answer to the ultimate question

— There is a town called Scrabble in Virginia in the US

— In 1985 Lieutenant Commander Waghorn and Lance Corporal Gill played Scrabble continuously for five days when trapped in Antarctica

Source: Mattel

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