Commitment, consistency, the path to my scrabble success — Clinton Imode

By Oluwatobiloba Zeal-Adepetu Kumoye 

  

  

  

For onlookers it's an overflow of the precious yellow metal, but for Clinton Imode, it is the reward of years of hard work, constant reading and sleepless nights beyond number.

This is the backstory of Nigeria's new kid on the block, Clinton Imode, triple gold medalist at the scrabble event of the 2nd Niger Delta Games, recently concluded in the historic and cultural city of Benin.

He described his outstanding performance as the culmination of years of training, day and night, through the ups and downs.

“It was great, I felt like all my years of hard work had finally paid off, training day and night, it was the best feeling,” he said.

To claim top honours in the three different Scrabble categories, Clinton Imode had to scale through a very strong field of Scrabble word legends.

Heading the long list, is Africa Youth Scrabble Champion, Prestige Achibong, who was also a member of victorious Team Nigeria to the World Youth Scrabble Championship.“It was a tough field of players, I struggled but then, I'm very grateful to God for the flow of tiles and how I won,” he stated.

Imode also had some nice words for other Scrabblers he knocked off the board during the event, urging them to put in more effort, adding that maybe next year will be their year.

“They should put in more work, more work is required to improve your game you must study, and learn how to play on the board. You can improve and come back next year,” he explained.

Imode was full of praise for his parents, the backbone and foundation of his Scrabble success.

“My family has really been a big support to me, my mum and my dad, and my siblings they have been very supportive to me, financially, morally, spiritually, they really tried for me. Niger Delta Games was a very cool one, and I really enjoyed it,” he concluded.

He thanked the organizers of the Niger Delta Games for putting together a memorable event.