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WSC 2007 Player Roster

http://www.wscgames.com/2007/roster_long_alpha.html

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Profile:Ganesh Asirvatham


Ganesh Asirvatham
by Elie Dangoor

Interview with Ganesh Asirvatham

Thanks so much for letting me ask you some questions. I hear you took a year off Scrabble - what did you do?

I've been concerned that I was leading a very one dimensional life. All i had was work and scrabble. I took up French (completed two external papers), went to Somalia to set up an English language centre, and spent time on community related activities. Recently i've just started my masters and that's taking up my time as well.


Did you take The Word List with you?

Nope. I wanted a clean break.

Did you miss playing?

At times . But i didn't miss the study. I love words, i love the feel and texture and sound of the exotic words all scrabblers strive to play for but to sit and look at columns of words for hours was something i didn't want to do anymore

Have you started a comeback?

I've made efforts which suggest that. :)

Your record in WSCs shows a continuing improvement - 54th, 36th, 22nd, 4th and 2nd.
Will you be taking up your place at the WSC to try to gain 1st place that we know you're capable of?

It won't happen this year. The level of play that you need to sustain consistently is missing. I'll be happy for a decent finish.


Who do you think are the toughest players you have played against and why?

Nigel - extraordinary word knowledge and excellent board vision. Pakorn, Panupol - the thais are generally very strategic and they can make life difficult with moves that seem to restrict board movement.


Are there any words you have played that you're particularly proud of?

Playing FRUGALITY on to AL against Nigel. The rack had a blank somewhere and it was on a tight board. Playing NORMALITIES - i extended NORM. I'm sure there are other plays but my memory is playing tricks on me. I'll email you more if i can think of them.


Do you keep TWL by your bedside and check the odd word in the middle of the night?

I used to!

You had amazing Causeway tournament results in 2006 and 2007, particularly in 2006 where you averaged over 500 per game against top class opposition - how much does luck play a part and how much is it about 'being on fire' and spotting all the possibilities?

I had amazing racks during that tournament. I don't know if spotted all the possibilities but it was as if i could do no wrong. "being on fire" would be one way of classifying it.


Do you have hobbies besides Scrabble?

Scrabble seemed all consuming when i was taking it up seriously. Nowadays i'm more than happy to try new things/activities.


Do you like living in Malaysia and which other countries have you been to that you like?

I love living in Malaysia but the state of malaysian politics has made our future untenable. Australia seems like a reasonable country :)


Many thanks, Ganesh and good luck with the comeback!

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Profile:Gareth Williams


Gareth Williams
by Roy Kietzman


Experience counts, Gareth Williams insists, as he landed in fifth place at the eighth World Scrabble Championship in November 2005. Though he was in fourth place in the WSC in 1993, “I feel that to achieve fifth 12 years later was perhaps harder, in that there are a lot more players of immense strength in the world now,” he explains.
“You only have to glance at some of the names in the bottom half of the WSC 2005 final table to confirm that. “In both cases, if I’d been offered that result before the tournament started, I’d have been delighted to take it,” Gareth said, “but, of course, there were times, on both occasions, when an even higher position was possible. “In retrospect, one then remembers the crucial errors.”
Gareth insists he has “a relatively weak vocabulary, at WSC level.” Having identified that weakness, “It’s therefore disappointing that losses have stemmed from missing words I did know….“Occasionally, I get impulsive, playing about looks like a good move on a two-second analysis, even when I’ve plenty of time.”
Born in Cardiff, Wales, the 53-year-old lecturer in maths and information technology at Coleg Morgannwg [roughly Glamorgan college] started playing Scrabble in 1982 at Cardiff Scrabble Club. He also belongs to the Newport Scrabble Club. Gareth who was an honours, first class, graduate from the Open University, received a post-graduate certificate of education.
He has also competed in Australia, Germany, Ireland, Malaysia, the Netherlands and the USA. The Welshman has already booked to get into the Saxon-Germanica double-header competition in July in Germany. “I hope to enjoy that as a social event as much as a serious contest.”
The British Masters Scrabble Championship is on his tourney calendar in August, that is, if he doesn’t head to Brazil. However, looking back at the WSC, “it was a fantastic experience.” Out of the 24 games, arguably the best match was against Gerry Carter (Thailand), “partly because we were restarting on the third day after I’d had a long run of wins, and I often start a day slowly, that is, playing badly, but on this occasion I felt good from the start and that I was seeing all my options and making good decisions.
Mind, it helped that Gerry started the game with a phony.” Ending on a high after that game, “I’d felt I was into my stride and then played carelessly, giving Ganesh Asirvatham, Malaysia] an easy 64 for ‘qi’ when I had a host of other options, and he had rack problems which I solved neatly for him. I made other bad choices, too, in that match.
However, having now played in seven WSCs means “I wasn’t overawed by the occasion. I think I’ve a good temperament and usually focus well on the game situation.” Gareth admits he spent very little time in preparation but did accustom himself to the five-point bad-challenge penalty with fellow aces John Grayson and Neil Green.
But he made no dedicated attempt to learn new words though “I have to admit I try to pick up stuff from the magazines, from UK Scrabble, from just playing, of course, but it’s all completely unsystematic. “I bought Official Scrabble Lists for the current word source about five years ago and have been working through it, marking words I wasn’t sure of. I’m currently about half way through it.
Gareth believes the role the World English-language Scrabble Players Association should play is “working towards achieving and maintaining worldwide convergence as far as possible on rules and the dictionary. “In respect of ratings, I think world ratings are valuable, and, in view of the low proportion of games played between players from different countries, we should maintain parallel system indefinitely.”
When not honing his strategy and techniques in the brainy game, Gareth likes to read historical works, then compile genealogical tables from them. However, the conviviality of the table, good food and beverage, are also important to him as well as listening to fine music. Gareth’s prize money at the WSC as partly spent on an MP3 player.
“Having transferred most of my digital-based musical collection to it, I’ve filled two-thirds of the 20 gigabytes and still have a lot of vinyl LPs to include so I might be forced to spend the rest of the prize money on a larger model.” As one of the earliest batch of Britain’s grandmasters, Gareth cites winning the BMSC in 1989 and the UK masters seven years later as among his treasured achievements in the mind sport. With challenging Scrabble events on the horizon, he’ll doubtless discover more crowning achievements.

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