Polish your tiles and open up those boards, the inaugural Manx Scrabble Championship will be held on May 9 and 10 at the Sefton Hotel in Douglas.

The event - affiliated with the Association of British Scrabble Players - has already gained considerable momentum and the attention of the World Scrabble Players’ Association.

There are entries from Scrabble grandmasters as far away as Australia and New Zealand.

It is being organised by Douglas resident Gillian Street who was keen to find fellow Scrabble enthusiasts and also to play some good games.

The Australian moved to the island in 2017 and has struggled to find other players of the game she loves.

She began playing as a child in Australia with ’my very patient grandmother’.

She said: ’She would wait while I waded through the dictionary finding words. I was pretty good at spelling and quite a lot of it (playing Scrabble) is about maths.’

She also thinks the game satisfies a gambling instinct in the luck needed to secure a favourabe set of tiles.

Gillian rose to be West Australia Scrabble champ in 1995.

Appropriately her award was presented on what would have been her grandmother’s 101st birthday.

The competition is open to all and it is hoped island players of all abilities will enter.

There are three bands: the top division is A, followed by lesser abilities in B and then C.

Gillian is a mid-B band level and to help others gauge their ability she can play against them but, as she has a knee injury, is immobilised, and they need to live on a bus route. Or there are sessions in the pipeline to play at the Manx Legion Club in Douglas on Friday nights.

As an indication of level B, Gillian aims to put all her tiles down at least twice a game.

The event will also promote youth Scrabble and on the Friday before the championship, there will be a workshop for schools.

The Steam Packet is supporting this by transporting more specialist boards and Visit Isle of Man is supporting the whole event.

For more information, email [email protected]