The Invitational University Scrabble Championship, “THE SPELL 2019” organized by the Department of Physical Education of University of Kelaniya annually since 2015, was held at the Kelaniya University Gymnasium on 9th of November 2019 with the presence of four universities University of Kelaniya, Colombo, Sri Jayewardenepura and Moratuwa scrabble teams in both men’s and women’s categories.
The Opening ceremony was done according to the tradition and the Chief Guest for the occasion was Sr. Prof. S. R. D. Kalingamudali Chairman of the Sports Advisory Board of University of Kelaniya.
There were 6 rounds in total for the tournament including finals and consolation finals. First-round was conducted using a random draw with the participation of 8 teams from women’s category and 7 teams from men’s category and the next 4 rounds were done using KOTH(King Of The Hill) draw.
After 5 heated battle rounds, the results depicted on the leaderboard were as follows
Men’s Division
1. KEL A (5 round wins, 18 match wins, +1483 margin)
2. MORA A (4 round wins, 20 match wins, +3088 margin)
3. COL A (3 round wins, 15 match wins, +1696 margin)
4. KEL B (3 round wins, 11 match wins, -489 margin)
5. COL B (2 round wins, 9 match wins, -1458 margin)
6. Japura (2 round wins, 8 match wins, -1794 margin)
7. MORA B (1 round win, 9 match wins, -2276 margin)
Women’s Division
1. COL A (5 round wins, 19.5 match wins(one draw), +2367 margin)
2. KEL A (4 round wins, 20 match wins, +2592 margin)
3. KEL B (3 round wins, 17 match wins, +1550 margin)
4. MORA A (3 round wins, 16.5 match wins(one draw), +2261 margin)
5. Japura A (2 round wins, 10 match wins, -1544 margin)
6. COL B (2 round wins, 9 match wins, -578 margin)
7. MORA B (1 round win, 5 match wins, -3864 margin)
8. Japura B (0 round wins, 3 math wins, -2784 margin)
Thus, according to these results, University of Moratuwa A team and University of Kelaniya A team met each other at the final while Colombo A and Kelaniya B entered the consolation final round in men’s category. In women’s category, Colombo A and Kelaniya A played for the championship while Moratuwa A and Kelaniya B battled for the third place.
After a breath-taking final clash , Moratuwa A grabbed the championship by beating Kelaniya A by 3:2 and turning them into runners up. Former champions Colombo A had to satisfy with the third place.It is to be noted that in the five years history of Spell, this was the fist time that UOC lost a championship in either category.In the women’s category, Colombo A conquered over Kelaniya A with a dominating victory of 5:0 and Kelaniya B defeated Moratuwa A in the consolation final, securing the 3th place in the final list.
The closing ceremony was held in the evening with the honorable participation of the chief guest, Dr. Lalantha Amarasinghe President of Sri Lanka Scrabble League.
Hasindu Avishka of University of Colombo and Nimesha Dilini of University of Kelaniya crowned as the Best Player of the Tournament respectively in men’s and women’s categories while Moratuwa A and Colombo A awarded as Champions respectively.
Mr. Suresh Chinnaiya, former National Scrabble Champion and Mr. Sapumal Gamage, the Treasurer of the Sri Lanka Scrabble Federation was present at the event and gave massive support by judging the whole tournament.
Official media coverage was done by MoraSpirit crew throughout the day.
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