A BISPHAM youngster will travel to the Millennium Dome tomorrow on September 1 to take on the rest of the country's best Pokmon players in the Nintendo Pokmon Championship 2000.

Tom Stewart, 14, will travel to London and battle against the 25 other regional heat winners from the UK in a three-day tournament of the popular computer game in the hope of making it through to the European championships and, ultimately, the world final in Sydney, Australia, in September.

For those who don't know what Pokmon is -- it's the latest craze to affect youngsters. Pokmon is short for "pocket monsters". What started out as a Nintendo computer game quickly spawned a collector card game, cartoon series, feature film, toy range and the usual spin off products of lunchboxes, watches, socks etc. The basic idea is simple -- search around for monsters, then train them to fight other monsters. The more fights you win, the better your monsters get and the more you can get on your side.

Tom, pictured here with his favourite game, told The Citizen how players pitted their monsters against each other in a knockout tournament at Manchester's Trafford Centre, as well as having a go at the trading card game and the Game Boy and N64 versions of the game.

He said: "It was a close competition. Everyone wanted me to beat this guy who wasn't playing fair and was using some dirty tricks to win.

"I beat him in the end though and now I think I've got a good chance at winning and so does everyone who will be there to support me."

As well as playing his favourite game all day long, Tom will get the chance to see the city on his all-expenses paid trip to London. He said: "I'm really looking forward to the trip. My Mum is accompanying me so we should be able to do a spot of sightseeing too."