The WESPA Youth Cup (Informally known as the world youth scrabble championships) 2023, will take place in Trang Thailand from Dec 01 to Dec 03. The Scrabble Federation of Sri Lanka being the official governing body for the sport in the country will conduct a selection tournament in two stages to choose participants for the event. In 2022, the Sri Lankan team secured several awards including Best Team, Under 16 World Champion, Best Female Player, Group Stage Winner and Group Stage runner up.
The first stage will be a 9 round Swiss format tournament to be held on the 1st of October at the Sanhinda Leisure Centre in Colombo. All those players whose name appears on the national ratings list on the day of the tournament will be eligible to take part in the event provided they are under 18 years of age as at 31 Dec 2023.
The top 11 placed players from this event will advance to stage 2 of the selection tournament. If at any point in the tournament it is clear that a certain player will qualify for the finals even though he or she loses all the remaining games, he or she may be taken out of the draw. This is process in scrabble known as gibsonization. Should such an event take place the tournament director will make a clear announcement on how it's been carried out.
There will be no trophies or certificates for this event. According to the constitution of the Scrabble Federation selection tournaments are rated.
Registration for the event requires a Scrabble Federation Player Id. Entry fee is Rs 1,200
The 11 qualifiers from the finals will join nine members of the team who represented Sri Lanka as WYC 2022 in 20 round all play all tournament (Round Robin). The nine players who automatically advance to the stage two without having to play stage 1 are:
Should any of the above nine players, or any of the players who advance from stage 1 decline to take part in the second stage of the selection process, the opportunity will be given to the next eligible player.
It is a requirement that all those who take part in selection tournaments complete the tournament and will not be allowed to withdraw halfway through.There will be no trophies and certificates for this tournament. It will however be rated.
The venue was changed from Duplication road reception hall to Sanhinda Leisure Center on the 25th of September
The Scrabble Federation is unable to reimburse the players for their travel expenditure to Thailand.