On 24th July the Broadwas team of John Guy, Stuart Smith and Gill Brooks set off for Kenilworth to play a match in the West Midlands Association Croquet League. Unusually, Kenilworth had requested that the match was not played in the usual ‘whites’ as some advertising photography was taking place and brighter colours were preferred.. However, Broadwas had to take lots of rainwear to allow for the predicted heavy rainfall.
On arrival Broadwas discovered that the Kenilworth team included Pete Trimmer with a handicap of -2 (yes that is minus 2). Pete is an ex British Men’s Champion and in the past was ranked 3rd in the world!!!
The morning session saw Stuart having to play Pete. Pete started by scoring 13 points with his first turn (11 hoops with first ball plus 2 peels). Stuart battled hard but the Kenilworth man came through 26 – 12. In a tight game John overcame the Kenilworth number 2 by 20 -16 on time and Gill held her nerve to win a very, very tight game by 10 – 9.
So 2 games to 1 to Broadwas at lunch.
In the afternoon John drew the short straw and had to play Pete. Everything started well and John was leading 10 – 9 having used half of his 8 bisques. Pete then hit in and scored his remaining 17 points in one turn. This included 12 points with his second ball; a triple peel of his first ball and pegging out both balls. An incredible performance to take the game 26 – 10 and put the overall match score to 2 – 2.
Now all down to Stuart and Gill. With 5 minutes remaining Stuart was one hoop down but with his next turn managed to score 2 hoops and scatter the balls to all 4 corners to ease through 19 – 18. All eyes turned to Gill who was near the end of her match and 3 hoops ahead. A good piece of play allowed Gill to score 2 more hoops then leave a difficult position for her opponent who was unable to score, leaving Gill the winner by 16 – 11.
So 4 – 2 to Broadwas but the bonus point for scoring most hoops went to Kenilworth, leaving Broadwas the winners by 4 – 3.
A tremendous days play. Despite the triple peel from Pete Trimmer (the first ever in a match Broadwas have been involved in) the Broadwas team won the day. Particular congratulations to Gill who won both her matches.
And it didn’t rain!!!!!
John Guy 25/7/21