FOCAL’s favourite creative writer Kate Scranage brings us a recap of our recent rendezvous in Birmingham

6:30 Friday night and 23 luscious lexical lovers slipped out of their wellingtons and into The Wellington, where they worked their way up to the top floor – which left some of them somewhat out of breath. Bearded man of God MRSA, correction MSR, gave everyone his blessing before plunging in to a thoroughly warming warm-up event. Having gone hard at it for four rounds, a tight final saw Dylan Taylor squeeze out Matthew Brockwell in a 70 – 67 climax. George Armstrong came in third, with Ed Byrne only a point behind. There were also rude word and religious word prizes for Sam Stock and Tom Finn respectively.

Saturday dawned and 42 of us squeezed in to Cherry Red’s very snug top floor. Attenders were a mix of regular comers, irregular types, some who hadn’t been to an event for a couple of years and one newbie. The Vicar of Dudley MSR, efficiently supported by the lovely Beachy, pushed on through the admin, with MSR chastening us into submission when his teacher voice boomed down from the pulpit (aka slightly raised area at the side of the room).

The event was played ‘Lincoln style’, with three to a table. The first draw was random – I was thrilled to be drawn against Countdown legends Adam Latchford and Ed Byrne. Like a rose(4) between two, er, roseroots(9). Still, I played along for the laughs and was quite relieved to score anything at all. We managed to squeeze in two rounds before a well-deserved refuelling, after which MSR hosted a magnificent University Challenge style quiz. Teams were grouped by age, and the young guns were first over the line, with a win from Logan Skelton, Tom Finn and George Carey.

After lunch we girded our lexical and numerical loins to go at it again, playing a further two rounds before building up to a one-on-one final between Dylan Taylor and Tim Hebbes. I can’t give you the detail of what took place, not because I was swooning with excitement (although that too) but because I didn’t know I was writing this blog until afterwards and I didn’t take any notes (sorry). But I can tell you that Dylan powered through to an 85-59 finish for a double-header sweep. Third place went to Adam Latchford, whose total points score almost equalled Dylan’s at 550 vs 554. Phil Stanton won the rudest word prize (fucker!) and was awarded with an exquisite book of risqué poetry from up and coming author Katie Daniels (£6.95, contact me for copies!) Other prizes went to Steve Hyde (religious word), Matthew Brockwell (Tim Down award), Bradley Horrocks (tough luck), and Annie Henry (second wind). Congratulations to all!

After the tournament we headed to Bella Italia, where the staff tried hard not to openly show how annoying they found us, and we enjoyed some splendid grub and banter before retiring once again to the top room at The Wellington for a controversial game of “Most likely to…” Apparently, I was thought most likely to reveal part of my body to an official in order to get let off a minor offence; I would like to take this opportunity to vehemently refute this theoretical behaviour. (Obviously, I would show two parts…) (Finer elbows have rarely been seen).

Finally, somebody must have sneezed on the pens because about half of us came down with a killer cold on Monday, just like Bonnie Blue did after too many, er, numbers rounds. Bravo to the Super Spreader, whoever they may be; bless you, and swift recovery to all the afflicted!

If you haven’t satisfied your FOCAL fix yet, why not join us for our next upcoming tournament in Reading on August 30th?