Author: David Guyton

There was a national Love Parks Week from 14 to 23 July to celebrate these valuable open spaces and recreation areas. As its contribution to the event, Cheshire West and Chester Council sent out members of its Green Space team to local parks with special heart-shaped notice boards for park users to write their own personal message “I love my park because … ”

The Green Space team happened to visit Westminster Park on the afternoon of Monday, 17 July, when the weekly association croquet session was in full swing. Mustering all their literary skills, the players gladly obliged and displayed their completed heart-shaped notice boards which were duly photographed and published on the Council website.

As all our members deserve their five minutes of fame the photograph is reproduced below.

Chester had another busy week’s play in four away matches.

On Tuesday, 11 July, ten players went to Craig-y-Don at Llandudno for the annual friendly fixture between the two sides. There were many close games during the day but in the end Chester went down in what proved to be a generally tight contest. The club is now looking foward to staging a return match at home in September.

On the following day, Wednesday, 12 July, the Chester Centurions team travelled to Earby to face Pendle Tykes in the North West Level Play Golf Croquet league. The team of David Crawford (captain), Chris Slater and Trevor Farrell enjoyed a good day’s play beating the opposing Pendle team 12 – 6.

At the weekend, another team of Jerry Guest, David Boyd and John Dawson tried hard but lost all their games in the North West Advanced B Level league in an away match against Fylde on Saturday, 15 July.

On the following day, Sunday, 16 July, Chris Thomas (captain), Jayne Taylor, Maureen Ivens and Janet Jackson won their North West golf handicap match 10 – 8 at Bury, enjoying a good humoured match in the summer sunshine.

 

A win for Chester against Bury
in the first round of the Longman Cup 2017

In the first round of this year’s Longman Cup competition Chester played away against Bury at Whitehead Park on Saturday, 17 June.

In glorious weather (some would say typical of Bury) the morning singles were halved, one game each to Bury and Chester, but the Chester duo of Paul Watson and David Boyd won the doubles. Half way through the afternoon the matches were evenly poised as the Bury players made good use of their bisques but the tide gradually turned such that Chester won all the afternoon singles to clinch the match 6-1, a margin which was somewhat harsh given the excellent play by the Bury team against a Chester team with significantly lower handicaps.

Final score:  Chester 6 v Bury 1

Chester are due to play at home against Bowdon in the next round

A win for Chester against Oxford University
in the first round of the Secretary’s Shield 2017

As a result of Chester’s win last year in the North West Federation’s weekend handicap league, the club was entered automatically in this year’s all England Secretary’s Shield knock-out competition. The first round match was against Oxford University which was played on neutral ground at Nottingham Croquet Club on Saturday, 10 June.

Representing Chester were David Boyd (captain), John Dawson, Robin Tasker and Brian Walton, and the team line-ups were as follows:

Chester	Hcp	Oxford	Hcp
John Dawson	4	Ian Plummer	½
David Boyd	7	Sophie McGlen	11
Robin Tasker	9	Mo Karaminjadrandjbar	20
Brian Walton	18	Jasper Theodor Kauth	24 playing off 20

The morning session saw the two lower handicappers from each club playing the doubles with the higher handicappers playing singles. By lunchtime Oxford had taken a lead of 2 games to 1, Chester having pegged out to win only the doubles. The afternoon session was off to a storming start, when John Dawson, no doubt inspired by his recent appearance at the ‘Inter Counties’, pegged out 26 – 0 in just forty minutes to win his game with Ian Plummer, (fortunately the murmurings about performance enhancing substances soon subsided) and now with the score at all square there was still everything to play for.

The remaining three singles were much more ‘pedestrian’ with two of them lasting until ‘timed-out’. Two of these remaining games were won by Chester and one by Oxford giving a final result as a win for Chester by 4 games to 3.

John Dawson & David Boyd	beat	Ian Plummer & Sophie McGlen	+6 (P) Chester
Jasper T Kauth	beat	Robin Tasker	+5 (T) Oxford
Mo Karaminjadrandjbar	beat	Brian Walton	+1 (T) Oxford
John Dawson	beat	Ian Plummer	+26 (P) Chester
David Boyd	beat	Sophie McGlen	+5 (T) Chester
Mo Karaminjadrandjbar	beat	Robin Tasker	+10 (P) Oxford
Brian Walton	beat	Jasper T Kauth	+1 (T) Chester

Final score:  Chester 4  v  Oxford 3

Chester play against St Albans in the next round.

Chester hosted the North West Millennium Short Lawn Competition on Sunday, 14 May. Sally Slater represented the Chester club, playing in a highly competitive field against nine other players from clubs in the North West Federation. Sally won the trophy in a tense final, holding off the challenge by Gail Moores of Southport to remain undefeated in the four round competition and win her first major title.

Following a successful visit by Dublin-based Carrickmines Croquet Club to Chester last year, Chester were pleased to make a return visit to Ireland over the weekend of 6-7 May. A total of seventeen games were played over the two days in splendid spring weather. Both clubs thoroughly enjoyed the friendly competition, and Chester emerged with a comfortable 11 – 6 triumph, claiming the trophy for a second successive season.

On Saturday of the same weekend, 6 May, Chester played at home against Bury in the Advanced B League and was edged out 2 – 3 on a very grey and chilly day. Jerry Guest was the captain with David Guyton and David Boyd.

Ladies Day at Chester

Not at the racecourse but at Chester Croquet Club where ten players from Fylde, Bury, Bowdon, Southport, Craig-y-don and Chester gathered on a beautiful May morning. Five gentlemen and five ladies (handicaps 3-9) all set for the NW Millennium association croquet short lawn competition. The first two rounds were closely contested but by lunch the ladies were on top with Barbara Young (Bury), Gail Moors (Southport) and Sally Slater (Chester) all having won two matches.

After lunch in the first semi final Gail held her nerve in her concluding break to beat Barbara whilst Sally needed a Rover peel (her first ever) to beat Jack Pattenden in the other semi-final. The final was a bit scrappy with both players affected by tiredness or nerves. Gail used most of her bisques making a 5 hoop break with only 3 balls on the lawn. Sally responded by taking her first ball round using only 3 bisques and after some further skirmishing Sally took her second ball round to make a nervy but effective peg out to win the title. Barbara secured the third place to make it a clean sweep for the ladies.

Overall an excellent day with some very good play on the slick lawns. The benefits of the full bisque format (ie no base as in previous years) were evident in that two thirds of the games finished in peg outs.

Thanks go to David Boyd for managing the event and to Pat Clare and her catering team for providing an excellent lunch and tea.

 

Following a succesful visit by Carrickmines Croquet Club, near Dublin, to Chester last year, Chester were pleased to make a return visit last weekend, 6 – 7 May. A total of seventeen games were played over the two days in splendid spring weather. Both clubs thoroughly enjoyed the friendly competition and Chester emerged as recipients for the second time of the trophy first awarded last year by winning 11 games to 6.

 

 

We are always pleased to welcome new members from absolute beginners to more experienced players. In 2017 we are holding a taster session for newcomers to the game on Saturday, 8 April, from 10 am to 1 pm. Click here for more information or contact our Membership Secretary.

At the NW Federation AGM at Culcheth on Saturday, 19 November, David Boyd received the trophy on behalf of Chester’s winning team in the NW Federation full lawn weekend handicap league. He is pictured here with the recipients of the other trophies in the NW Federation leagues.

Chester Croquet Club’s 2016 season came to an end last Wednesday with the end of season dinner and trophy presentations. Nine trophies were presented by chair, Sarah Andrew, at the end of the evening.

The trophy winners were Jerry Guest (Fletton trophy); Robin Tasker (Mason Cup and most improved player AC); Brian Walton (Hasting Wang short lawn bowl); Paul Taylor (Rabbits trophy); Janet Jackson (Mollie McBride trophy); Mel Hagan (Peter Bingham award); Judith Hawkins (most improved player GC); Chris and Sally Slater (Hermitage doubles trophy).

The club had some good results at Federation level, winning the weekend handicap AC league and coming second in the midweek handicap AC and the Level Play golf croquet competitions.