Category: News

Once again Peter and I took part in the “Greek Open Croquet Tournament”. This is held in Corfu which is currently the only croquet club in Greece.

The event was organised this year by Chris Roberts and Frances Colman. There were around 20 players with handicaps ranging from 22 down to -2 so a lot of bisques were in evidence. It is advertised as a holiday with croquet. The lawns have improved year on year and we were all made to feel very welcome by the Corfu Croquet Club

It started off with handicap doubles where Chris had arranged the pairs to be as similar as possible – so the 22 played with the -2.. Unfortunately there was heavy downpours towards the end of the first three mornings so the doubles had to be brought to a rapid conclusion to allow the other events to take place. The main event was 26 point singles which was won in great style by Duncan Reeve. This was intertwined with a 14 point competition where the winner was the player with the highest percentage of wins subject to a minimum number of games. At the weekend there was a light hearted level play GC doubles event which included the WAGS and the Corfiots. There was no fixed pairing. I didn’t quite understand the rules but it was fun.

A boat trip to the North of the island had been planned. Each day it was delayed by another day because of the poor weather at the start of the holiday. It finally happened – we were provided with a plentiful supply of ouzo, wine and beer.

On the last night there was prize giving followed by an excellent meal at the Corfu Yacht Club.

This is the third year I have attended but I don’t expect it to be the last having met a lot of people I would like to see again.

On a perfect morning, sun and no wind, Peter Allan and Duncan Sinclair did battle for the second consecutive day. They played the Prebendal Cup yesterday, with Duncan coming out on top after a tight match.

Peter reached the Final of the Championship by beating Anthony Hardwicke while Duncan beat John Garnett.

The match was played on a glorious September morning. The sun shone non stop and there was miraculously no wind. Thanks to Brian for brushing and switching the lawn before the players arrived.

Duncan started strongly in the first game and was soon 3-1 up. At Hoop 7 Peter dug deep and was continually clearing Duncan’s ball from 6+ yards, but could not get the better of an on song Duncan.

Duncan won that game 7-3.

The second game was more or less deja vu. Duncan taking a lead of 3-1 very quickly. His hooping was very impressive and Peter struggled to keep up. Another 7-3 win for Duncan.

Very well done Duncan on a brilliant display of Golf Croquet.

The full results of the competition may be seen.

The Prebendal Manor Trophy is our club’s annual internal AC Handicap competition. After Group stages and then quarter-finals, lasting through the summer, today saw the semi-finals and Finals matches take place in predominantly glorious sunshine.

The two semi-finals took place in the morning. Duncan’s didn’t last long: using his bisques effectively, he completed an 18-0 rout against Joe King. Joe only had 3 shots all match, all of which were long-range. The semi-final on the other court between Peter Allan and David Long was much tighter: a 10-hoop break in the middle of the game swung it in Peter’s favour, as he won 18-15.

In the afternoon, Joe beat David to 3rd-place with a 26-15 victory, finishing the match with a 14-point break (10 hoops, 2 peels, and pegging out both balls).

But all eyes were on the Final, where Duncan had quickly established a 12-0 lead – taking his yellow up to the peg before Peter had scored his first hoop. However, Peter fought back with a resolute 12-hoop break of his own before pegging out Duncan’s yellow and establishing a narrow lead. It was nip and tuck but, with Peter leading 16-15, Duncan got in again and was able to set up an almost-impeccable 3-ball break. Almost. After running his final hoop with the score at 25-16, Duncan then missed a 10′ roquet to give Peter one unexpected last chance. Peter made two hoops and seemed to be getting into his stride, but then disaster struck as his ball stuck in the jaws of 1-back.

Duncan’s ball was 20′ from the peg, but his aim was true… and so he won the Final 26-18, to receive the trophy from Joe (below). Commiserations, Peter, but congratulations, Duncan.

We like to play croquet on a sunny day. Sometime is it cloudy, or even raining, but playing in almost pitch darkness seems to be taking things a bit far. However, in our AC A-level league match at Basingstoke last Wednesday (31st August), Anthony’s game against Roger Barnacle went on until a hour after sunset. This is Anthony about to rush his partner ball towards the peg and peg out for a 26-21 win.

I played a vital roll in this game by walking up and down in front of the motion sensor of the club’s security light, the only source of illumination that was of any use. (Yes, that picture was taken with the light on!)

And the carrots? Not the pointy parts of a hoop, but Anthony had clearly been eating his carrots that day in order to see anything at all in the darkness.

Over the weekend of 27&28 August, eight players met to do battle in the Blewbury Super-B AC Advanced tournament. For the avoidance of confusion, I will note that the “super-B” refers to the range of handicaps that are allowed when entering the tournament (-1 to 6) and not that it is played to super-advanced rules. More than one person has been caught out by this!

The lawns were in excellent condition on the Saturday morning and all the players commented on this, mostly along the lines of “wow, they are green”. The weather was nice and sunny, if a little humid and everyone appreciated the gazebo and the umbrella.

The tournament was organised as a six-round, all-nearly-plays-all arrangement. There is not quite enough time for everyone to play each other. After the first day’s play, David Marsh was in a strong position, being the only player to have won all three of their games, including a triple peel in the first game, but there were three players chasing him on two wins each.

On the second day, there was an extra challenge due to court 2 drying out just south of hoop 1, making hoop approaches rather tricky. I was longing from some tips from Eve Murihead when I failed (again!) to get into a hoop running position for hoop 1.

Once the dust had settled, Beatrice McGlen emerged victorious. Both she and David Marsh had won five games each, but Beatrice beat David in their game.

We had two excellent lunches provided by Susan Tilbrook (on Saturday) and David Long (on Sunday).

As the players were departing, there was much talk of “see you again next year”. This is clearly a “must-do” event on the croquet calendar.

The Blewbury Croquet Club One Ball tournament held on the August Bank Holiday Monday was largely a members’ event though Caversham’s up and coming couple, Charles and Pam, hitched a lift with the Jamiesons to provide welcome variety. Manager Anthony Hardwicke divided his ten players into two groups of five, with everyone in A playing everyone in B. With few games taking up their allotted 60 minute span, he was able to slip in a random teaser round after Susan Tilbrook’s delicious home-cooked lunch.

Duncan cruised through the preliminaries, racking up six wins out of six, but there were six players on three wins needing four to qualify for the semis as the final matches kicked off. Those who held their nerve were Brian, Carol and David Long. With the fewest hoops among them, Brian drew the short straw: a semi final against Duncan, while Carol and David returned to a familiar battleground.

Duncan moved imperiously into a final against David, emerging victorious to receive the BCC one ball highball glass from Joe King. It takes its place in his long line up of trophies for basketball, volleyball, windsurfing and other disciplines. His bonus prize, a glassful of bird seed mixed with materials for filling crow holes, will come into use on Tuesday maintenance morning when he resumes his crusade against the big blacks. Thank you, Duncan, for creating playing surfaces worthy of a champion elect. We also rans enjoyed them too.

This is a national knockout competition (see https://www.croquet.org.uk/?p=tournament/caEvents/inter-club/ClubComps&comp=T) The East Anglia federation were unable to put a team together so our first match was in the semi-finals against Nottingham at Nottingham on the 22nd August. Unfortunately we (Joe, Brian, Carol and Steve) were a few games down at the end of the morning and needed to win everything in the afternoon. We didn’t, but caught up a bit, to lose 5-6. It was however an enjoyable day.

For next year, first refusal to represent the federation goes to the winner of this year’s Short Croquet league. If we beat Hamptworth at Hamptworth on the 14th September then we will be able to try again next year.

Players from other clubs were invited to BCC’s first official Short Croquet tournament on Saturday, August 6th. Only Noel from Eynsham and Tony from Swindon took up the challenge, leaving members with the lion’s share of the action. With five or six games each to play, Susan’s delicious pie and sinful ginger dessert provided a welcome interlude. As the scorching afternoon marathon unfurled, Noel and Peter – four wins out of five, – were hard to beat, with Duncan – four out of six – hard on their heels. However Joe, faced with two peels in every game, negotiated a clinical clean sheet. To him, the BCC shot glass and the round of applause.

As Rosemary Balsdon has pointed out in her email to all club members, the BCC car park is degenerating into a high risk zone.. Duncan Sinclair and Peter Allan have returned from play to find theirs cars minus their number plates; mine was robbed, though admittedly by my own fault as I left the door open. Rosemary’s experience – finding a van with its windows smashed in – is a new level of violence. In such a peacefully elite village, it should be simple for the police to identify the vandals. Until they do, best protect your cars, either by parking elsewhere or unscrewing your plates – as Peter does.

On Saturday, given that I was not on the cruise that I had planned to be on due to a bout of COVID (now fully recovered, I hasten to add), I decided to go along to watch the Blewbury AC advanced weekend tournament for entertainment and education, and I got both. It was very enjoyable watching top class players go round the lawn smoothly, putting their balls exactly where they intend to. Except that sometimes they don’t. There was the occasional poorly approached hoop, making it impossible to run the hoop, leaving me thinking “I do that!” Then the education part kicks in, seeing how the player deals with the adversity. Mostly though the level of play was very high with seven triple peels (TP) completed on Saturday plus one triple peel on opponent (TPO).

I found it very useful chatting with the players over lunch to find out how they handle particular situations. The answer is often simple; the trick is to know what that simple thing is!

Just before I left, there was an unconventional opening to a game. The first player played a supershot opening (the ball is played to south west of the peg). That is not so unusual amongst top level players. The second player shot gently at the first ball (mustn’t go through to B-baulk) and missed. The first player shot at the two balls and missed. The second player shot at the three balls (hard this time) and also missed. This left the first player with their two balls in the middle of the lawn along with one of their opponents balls. I have every confidence that they went round to 4-back and made a tidy leave from that position.