A blustery afternoon eventually turned into a beautiful tranquil evening. Similar conditions for the organiser too! But we had fun!

We had ten members and seven guests turn up for a GC tournament. Two guests (my wife Karen and my neighbour Jan G) had bad wrists so they got to share stalwart Tom. The two male guests (Adam and Steve G) are a right pair, so had to play together. Adam’s wife Jan D got the canny Roger S. Steve went into battle with daughter Hannah. Hugh and Gary had a great laugh last time so we put them together again. Sue joined former member Geraldine. Louise was paired with Oaklands Avenue neighbour Pat. Last but not least, husband and wife, Peter and Pauline, brought years of teamwork to the lawns.

As ever, there was some lively action. Shot of the day was Karen’s jump shot. Ask Tom about it! I captured quite a few photos from the play. Here are some of the pic(k)s:

Here are the results:

And to finish off, the winning shot by Jan D:

Sports’person’ship at its finest! Well done to Jan and Roger S! Well done everybody!

Simon played Colin from Merton in the morning singles just as the early rain stopped. Simon was quickly into his stride and without bisques achieved some good breaks, and did not allow Colin to threaten the inevitable result – 26-9 to Simon, well within the 3 hour 15 minute time limit.

At the same time, Roger joined Steve, as a terrified, nervous doubles pairing, against Julie, who had two years before beaten Simon in a thrillingly close match, and Jordan, whose handicap is just -0.5. Ember were really not sure what to do and there was plenty of cagey sparring with balls going to places never seen before. Luckily for Ember, Julie was also baffled, and could not get started. Roger and Jordan got started for both teams but luckily the latter did not tee up Julie for a run. Steve had chances and set up the balls beautifully for a long break only for his hoop running to fail again. That was Ember’s downfall sadly and eventually Julie got a good break together and Merton had 23 on the board, to Ember’s 17 when time was called.

Sandwiches for lunch under the small gazebo erected next to the lawn. The weather was quite nasty at this point but it soon cleared for the afternoon. It remained, however, incredibly muggy.

Roger took on Jordan in the afternoon singles with 11.5 bisques to his name. Again, there were some puzzling placements of balls at the start from Jordan, designed to eat away at Roger as well as Roger’s bisques. However, our man was unflappable and, though he probably used more bisques than he would have liked at the start, he built a break and played his first ball to rover, leaving Jordan no obvious way to get started. Surprisingly, Roger was left a relatively easy path to get going again with his second ball, and with six bisques left, if he could hold it together, he had every chance. Happily he did, including an excellent peel, and with one bisque left he ran out the winner 26-0. Well done Roger, it was a fantastic result!

In the doubles, it was more of the same unfortunately! Simon played beautifully and glided round, but when it was Steve’s turn, each time there was a glimmer of hope he’d break through the nerves and play his usual flowing style but the hoop-running gremlins returned. Julie and Colin bided their time and ground out a win, 22-14 at the bell.

It was a splendid day, despite the downpour, and Ember were relatively happy with the drawn result, though in reality it could have been 4-0. It was also fascinating to see Jordan play, and we wish him good luck in the qualifiers for the AC World Championships at Southwick next week.

On Sunday 2nd July, we staged an internal Golf Croquet (GC) tournament for twelve members, playing fifteen doubles matches on both lawns, from 2pm to 6.30pm.

Self-appointed team selector Steve gave each player a seeding so that the top seed was paired with the lowest seeded player, and so on. This nearly worked but we forgot to include Geraldine, and then Hugh did turn up, so we had to do a little bit of a jiggle of teams 5 and 6.

The teams were as follows:

1. Simon and Pauline
2. Roger S and recent recruit Sue
3. Steve and Louise
4. Tom and Peter
5. Hugh and new member Gary
6. Geraldine and Pat

Roger S had found and selected the best permutation of games to be played, so that each team had to play at least one game on the small lawn, and everyone was clear who played whom and when. This certainly meant changeovers ran smoothly and we were able to conclude the tournament in a timely manner this time around.

Each game was timed to last 35 minutes maximum, and of course the main lawn was double-banked so some delays were inevitable. Once time was up, each player could have two more turns each. It was good to rest up from time to time, and to catch up on the cricket score and the controversies unfolding at Lords.

There were some close games including a draw, which ultimately prevented one team from winning the tournament. Three points were awarded for a win, two for a draw, and one for a loss. Everybody stayed the distance and there were no walkovers.

The final league table looked like this:

So Pat and Geraldine were declared the winners by virtue of a better hoop scoring difference (DIFF column above), Roger and Sue were in second place, and Steve and Louise came a creditable third. Tom and Peter came sixth but had the role of giant-killers, winning 5-3 against the eventual winners. Pat’s spectacular long hoop run to clinch the draw against Sue and Roger S, was the shot of the tournament.

Here are some photos from the day:

For several years Ember Croquet Club has played against other local clubs in the South East Croquet Federation’s Beginner’s League, aka SECF B League. Given the rapid improvement in handicaps of our ‘younger’ players – Simon Charrington; Roger Stearn; and Steve Edney – this year we decided to join the ‘S’ League. ‘S’ denotes clubs with a single lawn, but the standard is higher as there is a lower restriction on handicaps.

The team has played two games so far, match reports recorded below:

CHEAM AWAY 5TH MAY

Ember’s ‘S’ league AC team, comprising Roger Stearn (capt), Roger Dollimore and Simon Charrington, travelled to Cheam for the first SECF match of the season – two rounds of singles and doubles, doubled banked.  Simon (11) was first up in the singles vs Geoff Gunton (6); while Roger S (11) and Roger D (9) played Brian (8) and Colin (11).  With the benefit 5 bisques and a midweek team practice/coaching session Simon successfully kept full control of his singles game vs Geoff, winning 26-0.  The first round doubles was a much closer affair with Cheam’s fast lawn proving challenging for the Ember pair to gauge, and time ran out for Ember to make up the final five point deficit.  With 1-1 at lunch (deliciously provided by the home team), the second round continued in very closely fought fashion, with frequent unforced errors on both sides.  With five minutes left on the clock all permutations of result remained open – win, draw, loss Ember/Cheam.  In the doubles, Ember needed to make up a two point deficit, at time, when, with the lawn well set, the ball lodged tantalisingly in the jaws.  End of game.   Now, with less than five minutes to go, a draw remained on the cards.  The ebb and flow of the afternoon singles showed it was anyone’s game, but ultimately finishing 24-23.  So, a 3-1 loss for Ember, but lovely day, hosts and lunch, and good experience for us in this elevation from ‘B’ League.

HAMPSTEAD HEATH HOME 27 MAY

In glorious conditions, both weatherwise, and our fast playing surface, the odds turned significantly in Ember’s favour when a mix up at Hampstead led to their being a player short, their star player at that (handicap – minus 1).  This was such a shame as we had mentally prepared ourselves to be playing against a very low handicapper, and with Steve on standby as substitute, when suddenly we had to reset our thinking, firstly how to contrive a match to lead to a result, and then to the reality of handfuls of bisques being available to our opponents, Tom Hankinson and Steven Eggelhoefer.  This was all negotiated and agreed in good spirit, and the match finally stuttered to a start, first with a singles, Simon vs Tom (26-7), closely followed by another singles, Roger S vs Steven – his first inter-club match – (16-11); then Rogers D&S playing the doubles in the afternoon.  This became a very close game, with the Hampstead pair concentrating mostly on splitting up the Ember duo, and both sides picking up the odd hoop here and there.  At 12-12, and getting close to full time, Hampstead missed a simple hit-in allowing Roger S to seize the initiative, run two hoops and be on the lawn when time was up.  So, final result to Ember, 3-0 plus the walkover, and a lovely salad buffet lunch (thank you Belita) and proper late-May English summer’s day!