Joe King won yesterday’s Kay Memorial Trophy, an appropriate result as he introduced BCC to the short format, established the club’s two successful tournaments and masterminded its successes on the wider stage. Even for a player of his calibre, it’s a tough ask to make four peels while staying ahead of an opponent with eight bisques in a 14 point game. It’s even tougher when the lady with the bisques is the redoubtable holder, Carol Jamieson, as ever reluctant to lose a trophy from her bulging cabinet
To the winner, the spoils. Joe displays them alongside Jolyon and Shirley’s plaque.
After seeing off ladder leader Andy E in the first qualifier, Joe watched Carol, winner of the eliminator against Peter Allan, take Andy down in the second one. . Earlier she’d challenged Joe to a future friendly. ‘Well, we’ve got our game’, he said with a broad smile as he walked onto the court for the final, ‘ but it won’t be friendly’.
Once Carol had used bisques to take her first ball to peg, he showed what he meant, creating cunning wirings with pinpoint precision. As you can’t be wired if you have no partner ball, he pegged her out as soon as he could and pursued his unwavering search for peels. He never made the fourth one but he crept and kept ahead until the bell tolled on 11-10. Clare and Brian joined the finalists for wine and snacks. It was a lovely day .
Setting up four short courts on two lawns is hard graft, but Carol and Brian had our corner of Tickers Folly Field in immaculate shape for BCC’s second SC tournament on Saturday, August 2nd. Carol secured the full complement of 16 players, despite irritating last minute withdrawals. One of the latecomers was Charles Briggs, her ever-smiling Caversham neighbour.
Elite contenders included Cliff Jones and Roehampton‘s David Openshaw, but only Debbie James from York and Charles were unbeaten at lunch. The quintet from Watford, strangers to SC until an introductory practice game the week before, were instant converts as they clocked up conquests.
Arranged in four ‘all play all’ blocks, three initial rounds were completed before David Long‘s excellent gourmet Coronation chicken. Afterwards, Charles and Debbie repelled the Watford wave – Jonathan Lambton Eddie Chung, Andre Machell and Simon Hathrell – to take first and second places.
Thanks to Simon, their Machiavellian miracle worker, Watford have now established their own SC program. The next day, he masterminded a crushing triumph over mettlesome Blewbury stalwarts in the annual friendly. Beaten in 2024 on the final day of their West country tour, Watford fielded a fiercer team with daunting results. ‘Same day next year’, shouted Captain Andre cheerily as they headed home. Ouch. Maybe Robin, Joe and Sophie could ring fence Sunday, August 2, 2026….
Blewbury hosted its annual weekend AC tournament over the weekend of 26-27 July. The field was notably high-class, with participants’ handicaps ranging from 1 to -2. Sophie McGlen managed the tournament most effectively, running it as a flexible Swiss with nine player, so that, although there was always someone not playing, they were not sat down for very long. As soon as one game finished, the loser played against the player who was waiting.
The weather was good on both days, with just a surprise light shower on Saturday morning and the lawns were in tip-top condition after spraying and verticutting the day before.
We had excellent lunches provided by Minty on both days.
Games proceeded at a pace on Saturday, with players completing two, three, or four games.
Sophie’s task on Saturday evening was to organise the games for Sunday so that hopefully we would have a thrilling finish on Sunday afternoon.
Two of the games in the final round had exciting three-ball endings.
In my game against Andrew Dutton, we had both made a break to 4-back, when I hit in with my forward ball. I decided to take that ball to peg, set a good leave, with the plan being to take my second ball all the way round. The plan was going well until I over approached 2-back giving me no chance of running the hoop. Andrew had an easy hit in and proceeded to make several hoops, but then broke down himself. I made three more hoops, leaving me on penult and peg. Andrew then took his second ball to peg and pegged me out. After some jockeying for position, we ended up with me for rover and Andrew for penult, with Andrew’s two balls on the east boundary. I could see that Andrew did not have a good rush to penult, so I kept putting my ball in a runnable position for rover, forcing Andrew to move it rather than make penult himself. We did this little dance for four or five times until Andrew did give himself a good rush to penult. Time to take the bull by horns or it would all be over. I shot from the west boundary at Andrew’s two balls just off the east boundary, aiming at the left one and hoping to hit the right one due to the slope of the lawn, and I did! It was now straightforward to get a rush to rover, make the hoop and peg out my ball for a narrow win. Those watching had enjoyed the spectacle, and discussing the tactical choices, which of course they would have done differently.
The decisive final game was between Joel Taylor and Nigel Polhill. The play was of a very high standard, with balls being positioned consistently accurately. Both players made big breaks, with Nigel being the first to take his first ball to 4-back and then his second to peg. Joel, now took his second ball to peg and pegged out Nigel’s ball. This developed into more of a classic 3-ball ending. Joel knew that Nigel was quite capable of hitting his balls from anywhere on the lawn, so he continually put his balls in wired positions, wiring both balls if Nigel was responsible for the position of his own ball, or leaving just one ball visible if Joel was responsible for the position of Nigel’s ball. At one point, Nigel called me to judge if his ball was wired and so could have a lift. It was close. Nigel was clearly wired on yellow, but not quite on red. Nigel shot at red – and hit yellow. Sloping lawns again! Nigel made 4-back, but could not make further progress. Near the end of the game, the position was as shown in the photograph. Joel’s red is on peg and his yellow on rover. Nigel is on the north boundary with blue at his feet. It was possible for Nigel to hit yellow by sending the ball through the narrow gap between the peg and rover, but after much deliberation, he decided to play to the east boundary and hope to get a better shot next time. But there was no next time. Joel cut-rushed red to rover, made the hoop and pegged out his balls to win. Well played Joel, a worthy winner. Both three-ball endings had a score of 26-22, and that is probably the only thing that is comparable between them.
No more qualifying worries for Joe King. On July 18, Blewbury Croquet Club’s chairman was awarded a replacement spot in the AC World Championships in West Palm Beach in September. He joins Robin Brown in the main draw, with Sophie McGlen rising steadily up the list – and hoping to join them. Bravo Joe – and very best of luck to all of you.,
Blewbury Croquet Club (BCC) returned to its roots yesterday with a splendid fiesta organised and run by Deirdre Cochrane. Such a joy to play on the court lovingly maintained over 30 years by her husband Malcolm in the peaceful grounds of their family home. David Long put in the hard yards to herd 15 entries into three groups of five for the preliminary block rounds – four games, one sit-out per player.
Two blocks were played on half sized courts at Blewbury, with Robin Brown and Edmund Shirley claiming wins that put them in the semi finals after lunch. Robin’s matches were over so quickly, that his block finished all 5 rounds in the morning. Edmund achieved his win despite losing his final game to one-ball novice Philippa Turner: a testament to the ball-by-ball coaching he so sportingly gave her throughout his defeat. Meanwhile, back at home base, David Seed edged Deirdre into second place, but then nobly retired in the afternoon to allow the queen to build on a morning of pinpoint precision.
After drinks on the lawn – thank you, Candida, number two daughter from Australia – the meal was served with appropriate style in the dining room, by Deirdre with a little help from Avril. Coronation chicken, new potatoes, salad and focaccia, followed by roulade and accompanied by red or white wine, slipped down merrily.
Then it was time to regroup for the final shootouts. With four and a half bisques and infinite knowledge of home turf, Deirdre saw off the indomitable Robin in one semi final, with Brian taming Edmund in the other. After a tough contest with Brian, the queen claimed the crown – the Roger Cambray Memorial Shield – for the 7th time; 25 years on from her first such victory. Chris Cambray, non croquista but still resident in Blewbury, did the honours graciously and stayed to tea – currant scones with clotted cream and strawberry jam, chocolate brownies – to round off a magical garden party from another age. Close your eyes for moment and you were back there in the 1990’s with BBC in embryo and the shades of champions past. Bravissima Deirdre on all fronts. I’m still reliving it today.
There were extra challenges to holding the GG 7+ level play tournament at BCC on the last Saturday in June. The Travellers’s five handsome caravans had rolled onto Tickers Folly Field with unstoppable right of passage three days earlier. On Friday night, the automatic irrigation system proved too tempting during the heatwave. Padlocks were cut off, giving youths the pleasure of frolicking among the sprinklers in the dark watches of the night.
An enigmatic champion – Bruce holding his first trophy
None of which stopped the Jamieson machine from delivering another impeccable event. It was primarily a Blewburian affair, with Bruce, Chris and the Freunds, eliminating the two visitors, Phyllis Court’s Steven Moreton and Basingstoke’s Liz Rhodes , from mainstream contention during the morning block play. While the travellers’s washing dried on the fence, the Freunds took on each other in the first semi final, with Chris against Bruce in the second. When all was done, Bruce stepped up to receive his first engraved Blewbury glass trophy – and a handicap improvement of 8 to 7. His victory path included four wins against serious contenders, his only loss coming against the ‘making up the numbers’ rank outsider. Funny old game…..
Although BCC is currently underperforming at league level, two of our finest AC players have recently achieved landmark personal bests. Like Carlos Alcaraz, Joe King has only lost one match since March – to Hamptworth firefighter, Tim O’Donnell. The work he’s put into getting his new handicap, -1.5, takes him significantly nearer to the AC World Championship qualifying week in West Palm Beach in September. At the moment, he’s leading the order of merit for the 24 slots on offer. If he were to make the main draw the following week, he’d join Robin Brown whose world ranking puts him in automatically.
When Peter Allan took up croquet nine years ago, he applied the intelligence and work ethic that built him an impressive international career in rocket science to a game that rapidly became an obsession. It took him about two years to recognise his potential and another seven to realise his dream of scratch: he achieved it recently at the recent National Veterans Championship at Cheltenham after wins over minus handicappers, Sarah Hayes and Sandy Grieg. Peter’s magic mantra is ‘no trivial shots’. Two inches , two yards, 20 yards: each must be thought through and executed with the same precision. Currently, he’s ranked 119 in the UK. Double digits is the new goal.
