Inaugural UK Open MCR Championship – 2018

As a curtain raiser to this year’s UK Open Riichi tournament, the first ever MCR rules tournament in the United Kingdom was held on 3rd August, attracting not only the small number of local enthusiasts, but also a significant group of overseas visitors from six different countries.

MCR is typically played with a more stringent discipline than in Riichi and this was evident in the way some of the inexperienced home players adapted to the rules, i.e., the hard way! Nevertheless, the tournament was played in good spirit and local understanding of this variant has increased enormously. It was interesting to see some Riichi players observing play during the latter stages of the tournament. Luc Humbert achieved the highest score available of 88 points for a single scoring feature when he collected big dragons in the first round. Sandra Berthommier won the prize for the highest score from a single deal with 120 points.

The large majority of the UK players were playing in their first MCR tournament. While there were therefore no great expectations of a home win, Andy Mathew, one of the MCR ‘virgins’ secured a creditable third place behind President of the European Mahjong Association, Luc Humbert, and the winner from Spain, Raul Rios Navarro.

Tournament Results

Represented Countries

Rank	Player	Country	Final Score	Final Points
1	Raúl Ríos Navarro		410	12
2	Luc Humbert		308	12
3	Andy Mathew		367	11
4	Bruno Manzo		304	11
5	Peter Langford		218	11
6	Anna Canova Putinier		157	9
7	Joel Ratsimandresy		116	9
8	Gemma Sakamoto		-25	9
9	John Duckworth		153	8
10	Tony Haley		79	8
11	Timur Hahn		133	7
12	Ildiko Hargitai		-11	6
13	Ian Fraser		-160	5
14	Annabel Di Domenico		-190	4
15	Jeanne Manzo		-83	4
16	Norma Todd		-285	4
17	John Todd		-491	4
18	Matthias Trinkl		-286	2
18	Sandra Berthommier		-307	2
20	Richard Langtry		-437	1