David Maugham won the Coles Championship

[<<] [>>] by James Death at Cheltenham
7th May (AC - Championships)

A slightly smaller field than usual contested the Coles Championship at Cheltenham this year across the May bank holiday. The anniversary of VE day may have made some players unavailable.

13 players in an untimed best of 3 knockout left one player with a late start and an unknown start time. Andrew Davies was the unlucky player having to wait and eventually started in the Main Event on Sunday, he did get a couple of early plate games on Saturday while waiting. The manager was happy to let things run untimed with 4 rounds and 3 days, hoping for efficient play on day one leading to best of 5 semi finals. That plan was gone by lunch time as only 1 match finished and only 1 game had been completed in any other match.

Early season and everyone using the Invictus balls for the first time may have lead to longer than usual matches. The balls played very nicely and it will be interesting to see how they react longer term.

Richard H Smith threatened an upset taking the first game off David Maugham but David used his vast experience and came back to win in 3 games. One first round match scored 145 out of a possible 153 points as they took all day to complete round 1.

Over the first two days James Death looked imperious and beat all opponents comfortably while managing organising the other games. David Maugham grew into the event looking stronger as the weekend went on.

By Monday morning, James and David were in the final and players were looking forward to an interesting best of 5 super advanced final between the top two seeds. James started strongly but faded with expensive errors while David was getting close to his best and ran away with the final 3-0.

The final of the Consolation was a ladies affair between Lorna Dewar and Louise Bradforth, Lorna being victorious at the end.

In the prize giving David praised the lawns as the best he can remember at the Coles.

A big thank you to all the volunteers, from the grounds team and hoop setters to the caterers and everyone else who works tirelessly in the background for the benefit of the players.

All the results are available on croquetscores