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Croquet Seventh Heaven for John Dawson

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English Senior AC Championships, Budleigh Salterton, 16-21 July 2018

John Dawson of Chester Croquet Club playing in scorching weather at the English Seniors Championship at Budleigh Salterton, Devon, last week took the C class title by winning all his seven matches by an average of eleven hoops.”

John knows how to celebrate his victory. He took his opponent out to dinner and the others in the queue at the fish and chip shop burst into applause on hearing of his victory.

His handicap has been cut to 3.

New Golf Croquet Rules Coming

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The World Croquet Federation have approved the 5th edition of the Golf Croquet Rules and these will be used for future WCF events. The Rules update has addressed known problems with the current rules and an attempt has been made to align GC Rules with some aspects of AC Law. The presentation style of the Rules is also closer to the style of the AC Laws.

The Croquet Association are responsible for the  implementation of  the Rules and at present it looks like January 1st 2019 at the  earliest through  to March 1st 2019 at latest.

There are some significant changes which will need considering at a future Federation Club Meetings in order to amend our League Rules (if appropriate) for 2019.

More details – Alan Morton at Fylde Croquet Club

24th Croquet Festival Shines in the Sun

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Westmorland are Crowned 2018 Festival Champions (North West Federation Festival of Croquet 23/24 June 2018)

2018 Festival Westmorland Festival Champions

A wonderful croquet weekend under blue skies, but despite a cooling breeze,  sun cream was still the order of the day for players as the 24th North West Federation Festival of Croquet took place in sunny Southport over the weekend of 23/24 June 2018.  Displaying a kaleidoscope of colours, about 100 players attended on each day, representing ten clubs from all over the North West – especially welcome were the team from Stonyhurst College, making their debut at this unique tournament.

The lawns were in excellent condition thanks to the weeks of work by Don Williamson and Terry Dunbar who prepared 17 beautiful Courts.  The infamous North Lawns played well and are now even envied by some clubs.  The catering team, led by Margaret Flemington once again excelled.  Early each morning, Southport members turned out in force, to ensure hoops, chairs, balls, pegs, coffee, etc. were all ready for the visitors.  Thank you Southport.

The Festival needs a fair bit of complex planning to ensure we have two days of croquet action – thanks to Liz Wilson for all the administration and a big thank you to Abdul Ahmad, who made a welcome return to Southport to manage the Festival with great efficiency.

The tournament enabled players of all abilities to participate and standard of play ranged from sheer brilliance to the ‘must practice more’ standard, but played in a great sporting atmosphere where advice and help was freely given but fierce competition was still evident.

In the Advanced Doubles, Fylde Croquet Club, once again took the title beating Bowdon in a final knock out match.

In the 18 Point Handicap, Bury emerged as the victors winning four of their six matches, closely followed by Westmorland and Chester.

The Short Croquet honours went to Chester winning five of their six matches and just edging ahead of Bowdon by a few games.

In the Golf Croquet event, Crake Valley were clear winners being victorious in eight of their nine matches, followed by Llanfairfechan and Westmorland.

The final twist to an excellent competition came when all the scores were suitably weighted and compared, the overall champions by a very slim margin were declared as Westmorland.

So we look forward to 2019 when this wonderful event will celebrate its Silver Jubilee – yes next year will be the 25th Festival – a very special event where all players will be requested to wear something Silver intertwined with their normal Festival colours.  See you back at Southport in June 2019?

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