Meadows West
It took five Scots to play three Italians on the occasion of the first match between the SCA and the Federazione Italiana Sport Croquet, which took place at Meadows West in fine weather on the weekend of July 26th and 27th. The Italians were Edoardo Lualdi (1), Andrea Pravettoni (4) and Gianni Leoncini (8); the Scots played James Hopgood (1.5), David Appleton (1.5), Fergus McInnes (3.5), Allan Hawke (7) and Jamieson Walker (9) in such a way as to try to give close matches in three doubles and nine singles games.
In the event the SCA had a narrow 4-3 lead at the end of the Saturday but won 4 out of
the 5 Sunday matches for a fairly convincing win. However some of the matches
were very close, as the results below show.
The best break of the weekend was played by Andrea. He was on three and peg before
David did anything competent, but that was to play an immaculate all-round break and
peg Andrea’s ball out leaving his own blue ball on the west boundary about a foot north
of hoop 2 and black fractionally outside corner IV. Andrea took off from blue to
about five feet in front of hoop three, ran it to the south boundary, hit black, rolled
up to 4 then 5 and 6, went to blue and rolled up to 1-back. With both black and
blue in the lawn now the finish was inevitable. David rather thought finishing from
a pretty good contact leave was limited to players with negative handicaps.
Buoyed up by his play Andrea also played well in the following doubles and he and
Edoardo disposed of James and David quickly enough for David to take the two Italians
on a sight-seeing tour round Arthur’s Seat to the Sheep Heid Inn while Gianni and
Jamieson went to time.
Several triple peels were attempted in the course of the match, but the only one completed
was in the first round by James, whose win against Edoardo brought his handicap down to 1.
Dinner was provided by Jamieson on the Friday evening and on the Saturday Jola, having
phoned several pubs and restaurants, finally managed to find room at the Stable Bar
which provided satisfactory meals.
The Italians kindly gave the Scots a plaque to commemorate the event; perhaps the SCA
will reciprocate by donating a trophy for what is expected to be a continuing fixture,
with visits to Italy possibly being scheduled to take place a week before or after
our matches in Switzerland.
A few photographs can be found here.
David Appleton
Results
(Scottish names first)
Day 1, Saturday 26 July 2008:
James Hopgood bt Edoardo Lualdi +20tp
Fergus McInnes bt Gianni Leoncini +15
Jamieson Walker lost to Andrea Pravettoni -10
David Appleton lost to Andrea Pravettoni -14
James Hopgood & Jamieson Walker bt Edoardo Lualdi & Gianni Leoncini +2T (18-16)
James Hopgood & David Appleton lost to Edoardo Lualdi & Andrea Pravettoni -25
Jamieson Walker bt Gianni Leoncini +2T (19-17)
Day 2, Sunday 27 July 2008:
David Appleton bt Edoardo Lualdi +18
Fergus McInnes & Allan Hawke bt Andrea Pravettoni & Gianni Leoncini +17
James Hopgood bt Andrea Pravettoni +24
Fergus McInnes lost to Edoardo Lualdi -3
Allan Hawke bt Gianni Leoncini +24
Match result: SCA 8, FISC 4