[<<] [>>] by David Haslam at Colchester Croquet Club
5 Jul 2012 (AC - Handicap)

John Andrews won the Colchester Midweek Tournament, with Terrey Sparks coming second.

The sun still failed to appear but 17 players from nine different clubs arrived from places as far as Penrith for the start of this over-subscribed handicap singles and doubles event on the lush, if rather slow, Colchester lawns. The singles competition was run as a flexible Swiss and included a significant number of low handicap players who had varying degrees of success. John Andrews (12) drew first blood with a 26 against the in-form Colin Hemming (0.5). Meanwhile the evergreen Terrey Sparks (1.5) was making a solid start with wins over Georgeen Hemming (10) and Terry Mahoney (2.5). A head-to-head between John and Terrey left John the winner. Suddenly it emerged that a dark horse in the shape of David Bateson (11) was gathering speed. And so into day 2 when John Andrews tumbled in his clash with the mighty Nick Steiner (1) but Terrey Sparks(1) had a further two wins. The sun had started to shine and this continued into the third day with not only high temperatures but high humidity. John started the final day with a win over Gerry Varndell (12) and Terrey prevailed against David Bateson thereby ending David's challenge. So, to the final round with John and Terrey level. Drama to the last as John fell to the rejuvenated Ron Atkinson ( 16) and Terrey succumbed to the Lincolnshire poacher, Mike Bowser (4). This left John and Terrey each on 5 wins from 7 and with John having beaten Terrey he was declared overall winner. The shot of the tournament must surely have been Colin Hemming's rover peel from a huge distance!

In the doubles competition, organised as two blocks with the winners playing off, the winners were a remarkably agile and jovial pair with an aggregate age of 165 years, namely Ron Atkinson and Terry Mahoney. The half games were judged by most competitors to have been a pleasant and fun end to each of the first two days of the tournament.

Results

Singles

1st Rev John Andrews
2nd Terrey Sparks
3rd Ron Atkinson

Doubles

1st Ron Atkinson and Terry Mahoney
2nd Jane Collier and Mike Bowser