With preparations for the Broadwas Golf Croquet squad’s second excursion into Europe in full swing, the team is learning more about the opposition they face in Germany at the end of May.
Led by captain Stuart Smith, team members Billy Nicholson, Ian Dampney and Jon Carrington will play in Kohlhof, 110km south of Frankfurt, on 31st May and the 1st June.
The squad discovered earlier this week that one of the members of the host club’s team – 1st Croquet Club Südwest – is ranked as 13th best in the world.
Greg Fletcher, an Australian, is one of a trio of brothers who have excelled in the international game. His younger brother Malcolm is ranked 17th in the world, whilst Robert, the youngest of the brothers, is currently ranked 1st in the world.
Stuart said that the top four members of the German team all rank higher than the Broadwas squad but added ‘It’s going to be fun.’
Stuart went on ‘Better news is that we generally rank higher than the Madrid team and Billy can be expected to play at least 300 points higher than his D grade of 1715. Also, Ian (with a D grade of 1809) plays a couple of hundred better.’ Stuart added ‘I’m 2002 and will try and play better this year and support Jon (D grade 2019).
The D Grade Golf Croquet Ranking System is part of the World Croquet Federation’s (WCF) Golf Croquet Grading System (GCGS), which assigns numeric rankings to players based on their performance in officially sanctioned matches.
Broadwas will also face the Czech Country Croquet Club which is based in Horice in the Czech Republic, and the Spanish side from Club de Campo Villa de Madrid.
The mood in the Broadwas team is buoyant.
I spoke to Ian Dampney during a practice session at the club, earlier in the week.
Ian told me he was very much looking forward to the tournament. ‘The highlight of the year,’ he said.
Ian said that last year he found the tournament ‘Daunting to start with but settled into it pretty well. I didn’t actually feel nerves and managed to keep things going.’
‘The Germans will be a challenge,’ he said. ‘We’re all playing against team members of higher rankings, but last year we found that to some extent, the rankings were misleading, bearing in mind they played a slightly different (more flamboyant) game. That’s fine if you’re accurate and go through, whereas our more cautious approach often left us in a good position.’
Ian will be travelling early to Germany, to tour with his wife Jan before the tournament. They will be taking a Rhine cruise for ten days, spending some time in Nuremberg before going to Heidelberg and then on to the tournament.
Paul Felton