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UK to host World Fruit Machine Anecdote Championship

Dagenham is to host the third annual World Fruit Machine Anecdote Championship in January, we can reveal.

Confirmation of the event is seen as a great sporting coup for this country, as well as for The Fighting Dog and Pikey public house which will stage the event.

The location is likely to suit the reigning world champions — Paul "Six Nudges" Bowers and Mark "It was about to pay out" Alden. The pair live locally and train at least five nights a week together at a cost of around £2000 per month.

Those spectators attending the event will be perplexed to note that The Fighting Dog and Pikey does not actually have a fruit machine at all. Indeed, the championship is not a test of a man's skill at the machine, but rather how well he can later recount his exciting pub gambling experiences to anyone who will listen.

Mark Alden explained: "I tell you I was the social club the other day and I pumped in about forty quid into that 'Ay Caramba!' machine up there, and then I nipped to the bog and old Sid put in 20p and took the fuc*kin' £250 jackpot. I knew I should have gambled on the Tequila super nudges, but the percentage shot was to up the ante on the two flashing pistoleros, then try and gamble my way into the cantina before collecting on the Ay Caramba! superskill 'dancing burro'."

Indeed, after ten minutes with the Essex pair it is hard to imagine anyone snatching their anecdotal crown. Bowers legendarily once put seven customers in his local pub into a deep coma by recounting the occasion on which he finally took the £25 jackpot on the ballbreaking "666 Fix!" — considered the "mother" of all fruit machines — after a relentless assault of seven hours during which he gained more than two stone in strong lager, but lost 750 pounds in hard cash.

Be that as it may, the lads face some tough competition. Australia's self-proclaimed "King of the Pokies", Bert Ho Kwok, is reputed to have been shot five times by his wife over the dining table as he attempted to explain to her the finer points of the "Waltzing Matila". And US supremo Chad Zimmer III lost both legs to bloodclots after standing motionless in front of the slots in a Las Vegas casino for three years. He is, in fact, the only professional "anecdotalist" among the competitors, who boasts that he can clear any bar in the US within two minutes of opening his mouth.

Whatever the outcome, it promises to be a fascinating contest. Any reader wishing to become involved in the sport should proceed directly to the nearest pub where they will find a team hanging round the fruit machine and entertaining anyone within earshot with their amazing tales.

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