Ealing Croquet Club

This year’s Charity One-Ball heat attracted a lucky 13 competitors, who were grateful that in almost springlike conditions the forecast rain at least stayed away.

The flexible format meant that players could have as few or as many games as suited them in the time, with the clear winner being David Graham, who was undefeated in three out of three games.

A very generous £147 of donations was raised for this year’s designated charity, the UN Refugee Agency UNHCR, and their famous house colour of sky blue was sported by many entrants.

The total raised entitled the club to two places at the National Final on Sunday May 7th, to be held at Surbiton Croquet Club. The second place all came down to the final match between Simon Tuke (who was on 2 wins out of 3) and Fred White-Overton (on 3 out of 3).

Fred had two bisques, which he husbanded frugally and seemed to have the game well under control, but unexpectedly missed the final hoop to let Simon sneak past to win the game. Both players now had three wins out of four and Simon took the second slot in the final on the basis of who beat who.

Fred, who mainly plays Golf Croquet is seriously considering playing more Association Croquet, which based on the quality of his croquet shots in this tournament, will make him a formidable opponent.

Many thanks to everyone for supporting this fun and worthy event, which nationally over the years has raised many tens of thousands of pounds for a wide range of good causes.

For those of you not familiar with One-Ball, you can read a brief description of the game here.

Article: Simon Tuke

Photograph: Tom Hartwell

Simon (left) presents the impressive One-Ball trophy to David. The trophy was donated to the club by Simon (no expense spared), who has been organising the event for a number of years.