WASHINGTON — It’s hard to say whether this is scandalous, impressive or both: A New Zealand native won the French-language world Scrabble championship despite what most would consider a handicap — he doesn’t speak French.
Nigel Richards, who lives in Malaysia but is originally from Christchurch, won the Francophone championship final on Monday in Louvain-La-Neuve, Belgium, defeating an opponent from Gabon, a French-speaking country in Africa.
Liz Faegerlund, a friend of Richards’, told the , “He doesn’t speak French at all; he just learnt the words. He won’t know what they mean — wouldn’t be able to carry out a conversation in French, I wouldn’t think.”
She says that Richards simply started studying the French dictionary about nine weeks ago.
Richards may well be the best Scrabble player in the world — he’s won the world championship three times and the US championship five, and Faegerlund says of the French-speaking players, “they know about him already, but they probably didn’t necessarily expect him to go in for the first time and beat them at their own game.”
est champion du monde de francophone. Mais il ne parle pas français !
— TV5MONDE.COM INFO (@TV5MONDEINFO)
