2019 July Advanced Tournament

Advanced Tournament 5-7 July

James Galpin has a sweep shot refereed by Clive Goode

James Galpin was a croquet player
Of credit and renown
His shooting and hoop running skills
Brought all his oppos down.

(after William Cowper)

The tournament winner was James Galpin, who rarely missed and won all nine of his games. He made the shot of the tournament: running hoops 3 and 4 and roqueting the ball behind hoop 4. Of the 14 players, eight were either -1 or -½ and the rest went from 1 to 5, so manager Eric Audsley did his best to keep the top players busy amongst themselves as far as possible. However the fact that their games tended to finish more quickly than the others (one six-hour epic notwithstanding) meant that players from the lower group sometimes found themselves up against much stronger opposition, with predictable results. In the lower group, George Collin, with five wins from eight games, won the prize for the most index points gained. Wrest Park provided half the entry, with John Tew coming in for two days.

Conditions were ideal: warm and sunny weather with fast lawns. Indeed , they were faster than we might have suspected. Duncan Hector, who had entered to mark the thirtieth anniversary of his first open tournament at Wrest Park, checked the height of the grass with a measuring prism to reveal that the height was closer to 3-4mm as against the 6mm to which the mower’s bottom blade had been set.

Our thanks to David Woolley and Tim Brewer for providing lunch and tea. David also made the tournament trophy, a wooden acorn.

Some late games which took place are not included in the summary below - in one Omeid recorded his third TP against Bryan Harral.

James Galpin (-1) 9/9

Omeid Hallam (-1) 9/11 2TPs

Bryan Harral (-½) 5/8 1TP

Clive Goode (-½) 4/7

David Marsh (-1) 4/7

Nick Steiner (-½) 2/7

Duncan Hector (-½) 2/8

Rod Ashwell (-½) 1/6

George Collin (1½) 5/8

Eric Audsley (2) 5/7