David Barrett wins Lancs Open Golf Tournament

The 5th Lancashire International Open Golf Croquet Tournament, played at Heaton Park on May 8-9, resulted in victory for home player David Barrett. In somewhat indifferent weather, the eight contestants battled through a round-robin on the Saturday, Chris Sheen leading with six wins to Roy Ware’s five, David Barrett on four, and Don Beck leading the tiebreak in the 3-win group.

The Sunday began with the consolation event of randomly paired doubles, the winners of all three games in the round-robin being John Moore and Roy Ware with Tom Weston and Chris Sheen second. The knockout 19-point semi-finals resulted in Chris beating Don 10-5 and David, who had been modestly surprised to reach this stage, beating Roy 8-6 on time. In the best-of-three final David began well and scored the winning point with an amazing hoop 12 run from corner two. He kept his cool in the second game and won it 7-4 to secure the championship trophy.

Full Results:

a) Qualifying Matches (All play All with top 4 entering a knock-out to decide the outcome). David Barrett beat Donald Beck 7-4; John Moore beat Patricia Duke-Cox 7-5; Chris Sheen beat Tom Weston 7-5; Roy Ware beat David Turner 7-5; David Turner beat Tom Weston 7-6; Chris Sheen beat Roy Ware 7-6; John Moore beat David Barrett 6-5; Donald Beck beat Patricia Duke-Cox 7-4; Chris Sheen beat Patricia Duke-Cox 7-3; David Turner beat David Barrett 7-5; Roy Ware beat Donald Beck 7-5; Tom Weston beat John Moore 7-6; David Barrett beat Roy Ware 7-5; Tom Weston beat Patricia Duke-Cox 7-2; Chris Sheen beat John Moore 7-3; Donald Beck beat David Turner 7-4; John Moore beat David Turner 7-6 Chris Sheen beat Donald Beck 7-3; David Barrett beat Tom Weston 7-5 Roy Ware beat Patricia Duke-Cox 7-1; Tom Weston beat Donald Beck 7-6; Roy Ware beat John Moore 7-3; David Turner beat Patricia Duke-Cox 7-3; Chris Sheen v/s David Barrett match unresolved; Chris Sheen beat David Turner 7-2; David Barrett beat Patricia Duke-Cox 7-2; Donald Beck beat John Moore 7-4; Roy Ware beat Tom Weston 7-3.

b) Knock out play-offs results: Chris Sheen, Roy Ware, David Barrett and Donald Beck qualified; Semi-finals: Chris Sheen beat Donald Beck 10-5; David Barrett beat Roy Ware 8-6; Final: David Barrett beat Chris Sheen 7-5; 7-4

Doubles Results (All play All): Winners: John Moore and Roy Ware 3/3; Runners up: Tom Weston and Chris Sheen 2/3; Others: Donald Beck and David Turner 1/3; David Barrett and Patricia Duke-Cox 0/3.

DAVID DRAY WINS LANC INTERNATIONAL GOLF by Abdul Ahmad (1/5/03)

David Dray from Ramsgate won the 4th Lancashire International Open Golf Croquet tournament playing with three different mallets! The tournament was held at Pendle on 26th and 27th April 2003. The weather was kind. It was bright and pleasant on Saturday; and, mostly bright but cold on Sunday. Play began at 9.45am on Saturday. On Saturday the format was Block play followed by a knock-out and play-offs for minor places.

All matches were closely fought. The shock of the day was John Moore’s failure to qualify for the knock-out stage. David Dray’s determination to win was demonstrated clearly after his mallet handle broke whilst playing in the quarter-finals. He completed the match with a borrowed mallet and finished the tournament with a mallet supplied by Professor Pidcock on Sunday. On Sunday play began at 9.15am. The knock-out section was completed, minor places were resolved and a consolation doubles event was contested by those not involved in the singles final.