Category: Match Report

Andy Evason (8), Andrew Petit (8), Steve Fisher (10) and Nigel Cox (11) travelled down to East Dorset for the first round of the Longman. Our opponents included a very new player who dropped from 9 to 8 following his win and a very good GC player who didn’t miss anything. In the morning we lost the doubles match and both singles. In the afternoon only Andrew prevailed – so we lost 6-1.

The annual Southern Croquet Federation one ball tournament came to Blewbury for the first time on Sunday, June 25th. 

This event attracted 15 entries – unfortunately Carol had a problem with her shoulder and had to drop out rather early on. The rest played a Swiss with six rounds. It was slightly disappointing that the entrants were all local, with High Wycombe as the most distant club represented

Deirdre provided an excellent lunch and the rounds continued.

Duncan won all six games and so won the tournament. David Long was just behind with five games and then Rick Lilley with four.

Duncan received the Armada trophy which he will keep for the year and another Blewbury glass to add to his collection.

On the hottest day of the year so far Blewbury beat Oxford University
3-0 in our first match of the SCF B League for association croquet,
level advanced play, after persuading Oxford to visit our courts for a
change. We solved their transport problem by running a car ferry from
Didcot Parkway before, and back to the station again after, the match.

Oxford began by taking a panoramic view of our courts to show their
groundsman what could be done if he tried. Peter Allan was the first to
finish his match, beating Mark Baker 26-7. Mark did ruefully comment
that he couldn’t help over-hitting on our faster courts.

Avril had a fierce tussle with the Australian Charlie Sharpe who was
really a GC player and showed it by running hoops and making roquets
seemingly at will, quite exceptionally for an AC handicap of 16. Their
match went to time with Avril just ahead at 21-20.

In the third match, Greg Simond had another sure eye for a roquet but
showed inexperience with his break planning. Paul Wolff ran out a
comfortable winner 17-5 on time, despite an infuriating number of
missed roquets in easy positions when the game was there for the
taking.

We consoled the Oxford team with cold beers from our fridge on their
way home.

Eight players, including Brian Jamieson and Steve Fisher, took part in this tournament which was arranged as a Swiss with five rounds played at Phyllis Court on the first day and at Blewbury on the second. Frances Coleman acted as assistant referee at Phyllis Court while Chris Roberts acted as ROT throughout – and was kept rather busy.

The games in the third round were pegged down at about 18:30 and restored on different sized courts at Blewbury on the second day.

Brian and Steve won two of their five games. There was only one peg out when Brian beat Steve but there were plenty of reasonable scores and participants seemed to enjoy the challenge of level play.

Michael Newman (9) from Woking had four wins to make him the overall winner of a rather elegant cup.

Paul Wolff, Deirdre Cochrane, Brian Jamieson and Steve Fisher travelled to Bristol to play in the first round of the Longman Cup (a knockout Handicap AC event with handicap restrictions). In the morning Deirdre won her match but Brian lost and we also lost the doubles putting us one down at lunchtime. In the afternoon Paul and Brian won while Steve and Deirdre lost. There was a cold breeze and we found the two courts were very different.

So overall we lost 3-4.

The weather was cold but dry for the club’ s first CA listed tournament of 2023 – a GC Open event with eight competitors, including BCC’s Paul Wolff. Handicaps ranged from +4 to -1.. The all-play-all format required almost continuous action throughout the day.

Last year’s winner, Philip Blake of Kenilworth, and Chris Roberts of Phyllis Court set the pace with three wins out of three. In the fourth round, they met in the match that would decide the tournament. Chris prevailed 7-3, then won his next two games to go into the final round with an unassailable lead .

The race for second place was much closer. In the last round, Philip Blake, Roger Goldring of Phyllis Court and Peter Adams of Guildford and Godalming were still in the mix. The draw set Goldring against Adams, with Peter taking a very tight contest on the golden hoop. Not enough. When net hoops were counted, Philip was the runner-up with +9 to +1

Speaking on behalf of all the competitors, Chris Roberts praised the quality of the courts and , in particular, the firmness of the hoops which had been reset in new positions by Joe King the previous evening.
Brian Jamieson