Ealing Croquet Club

Ealing won the LLoyd-Pratt Mallet in their friendly against High Wycombe on 9th April in a hard fought match that ended with a penalty shoot-out (again!). See the full report by Tony Elliott here.

There were 14 players gathered on a glorious Spring Sunday for Ealing’s heat of this year’s Charity One-Ball Competition. Andy Dibben’s excellent Flexible Swiss Excel programme was used to run the tournament, which meant the leisurely arrival of competitors during the morning presented no problems, with the computer scheduling games as and when everyone was ready. (The only slight hiccup came when the manager’s better half attempted to enter a result, causing a degree of meltdown from both man and machine.)

Players could play as few or as many games as they wished, with two enthusiasts clocking up 5. The clear winner was Margaret Page with 4 wins out of 4. Martin Blackmore was second with 3 out of 3, and Sean Doherty third with 3 out of 4.

It was good to see adherents of both AC and GC playing and prospering. In particular Luis declared that he had got the hang of it, pleaded for another game, and proceeded to thrash the manager with all four of his bisques standing.

Everyone’s generosity meant that we raised an impressive £170 (plus Gift Aid) for this year’s designated charity, the Alzheimer’s Society. This gave us two places in the National Final at Surbiton on May 17th. Margaret and Martin are unavailable, which means that Fred Overton-White (who tied with Simon Tuke on 3 out of 5) and Sean will be our representatives.

Many thanks to everyone for making it such an enjoyable day. We even tucked into unseasonal mince pies and Christmas cake.

Report: Simon Tuke

Photograph: Lindy Jordan

Congratulations to Margaret Page for winning the Sussex County GC B Level Tournament Plate on 26 April with impressive wins in each of the knockout rounds.

On Sunday 16th members gathered at the club for the annual ritual spring clean followed by a lunch of home made soup, bread and cheese, after which everyone played croquet. Simon Tuke and Tom donned their decorating gear to make the white room WCs even whiter, with most of the paint going on the walls. Tony, Louis and Jonathan moved earth (but not heaven) from the pavilion store to the lawn verges and did a plausible interpretation of Right said Fred moving the cabinet from the pavilion to the white room. Wendy, Gwyn and Emma cleaned a lot of balls, amongst other things. Emma was particularly adept weilding a broom and discovered quite a lot of wildlife, not to mention a pre-1990 How to Play Croquet set of rules. Margaret and Henry hoovered, whilst David helped Lindy fill up her car with rubbish. It was a good turnout and the club is looking suitably spruced up.

Report: David Graham

Photographs: Lindy Jordan

There were four Ealing players represented in the Open Handicap One-Ball Tournament held at Hurlingham on 13th October: Tony Elliott, Simon Turner, Margaret Page and Fred White-Overton. Tony managed third place, while Margaret and Simon took one of the four equal fifth places. For a full report see here.

The AC All-England National Final was held at Blewbury Croquet Club in Oxfordshire on 28-29 September, in which Ealing was represented by Sean Doherty and David Graham (see News dated 18 August). There were eight contestants, each playing five games to a handicap base of six, with player handicaps ranging from 2.5 to 22 (see here for results). The club is in a delightful rural setting, with two lawns that were in excellent condition. The play was made more enjoyable when the forecast heavy rain was not as bad as predicted.

Sean Doherty, who was one of three players with four wins out of five, was eventually declared the overall winner after lengthy deliberation based on who beat who and ‘quality’ wins*. Sean can be seen in the photographs looking very pleased with himself, as well he might. He not only won an impressive trophy, but also a plate for the winning club.

Report: David Graham

*Quality Wins: The three players on four wins had all beaten each other, so the criteria went to ‘quality’ wins; a system where you aggregate points based on how many wins your defeated opponents had (eg. Sean beat Peter who had beaten two other players so gets two points. Tallied up Sean and Margaret were still equal but Sean had beaten her so became Champion – Sean Doherty).

Photographs: Carol Jamieson

Trophy & Plate

For the second year running, Ealing will have two members playing in the AC All England Final to be held at Blewbury Croquet Club on the weekend of 21 to 22 September. Sean Doherty, David Graham and Colin McKenzie progressed from the club’s internal competition to the area final held at Surbiton on 24 to 25 August. Sean and David were placed second and fourth respectively in the area final, from which five players go through to the national final; see area final results here.

Sean, who curently has an AC handicap of 14, won four of his five games, narrowly losing 24-26 to the overall winner, Diana Wilson (handicap 2.5), in his final game. We expect Sean’s handicap to come down rapidly if he continues to play to the same standard.

Report: David Graham

Ealing got their Croquet South East AC U League campaign off to a winning start on Saturday 10th August with a solid win against our old friends from Hampstead Heath.

It was theoretically a home game for Hampstead, but held at Ealing as Hampstead only have one lawn. This meant that the visitors provided lunch, as well as some excellent flapjacks baked by one of their players.

The lawns were challengingly fast in places, especially around some hoop approaches, and became even more so in the afternoon when the sun emerged with a vengeance. The match was played full bisque with a base of 6, which meant that in games between higher handicappers both players received bisques.

In the morning doubles Stephen Harbron and Sean Doherty easily saw off minus player Phil Cordingley and newcomer Jonah Danziger +19, although Phil did a great job of introducing Jonah to the intricacies of match play.

Simon Tuke scraped past Sandy Nairne +6T, and David Graham lost to Tom Hankinson by the classic margin of -1T.

After a very convivial lunch, battle was joined for the afternoon session. Simon lost -9T to Phil in a rather scrappy game, Stephen had a solid +13 win over Sandy, while David just managed a win against Jonah +2T.

The performance of the day came from Sean, who used just one bisque to take his first ball round. Tom decided not to use his bisques immediately, and Sean promptly went round and finished in his next turn, to win +26 with the opponent having ten bisques standing; a classic example of how (or how not) to tackle full-bisque play.

Congratulations to the Ealing team, and thanks for representing the club so capably.

Report by Simon Tuke

The club’s Beer & Croquet social event on Thursday evening was a great success, played in glorious sunshine. The event involved everyone playing in first to four point GC handicap matches, which was quite challenging for lower handicap players, as opponents could start with anything from a one to four hoop lead. There were lots of prizes, but the overall winner was Luis Garcia with four wins out of four. Christine Mason came second with three wins, having lost to Luis. The croquet was organised by Simon Turner, who also picked up an award for Volunteer of the Year. Lindy managed to lift the Most Embarrassing Moment prize; something to do with making a spectacular jump shot with the wrong ball.

Photographs: Tom Hartwell