Golf Croquet Handicap 2012
19 May 2012, Meadows
Encouragingly, this year we had thirteen competitors compared with only five in 2011. It was very pleasing to able to welcome several new faces, as well as some returning players, to the Tournament. A special mention should be made of Anne Prees and Lesley van Vliet who play croquet part of each year in South Africa but who summer in Scotland and have now joined Meadows Croquet Club.
The intention had been to run the Tournament as two American blocks plus a final deciding round, but a last minute entry resulted in the format being altered to an Egyptian with six rounds. This did appear to work well and the allotted 50 minute time limit allowed most games to finish within this, resulting in each round starting at approximately one hour intervals.
SCA v CA of Ireland 2012
12-13 May 2012, Meadows
The Appleton Trophy has a Scottish side and an Irish side, and this year's contest for it had similar characteristics, being distinctly a match of two halves. On the first day (dry and largely sunny) the Scots won all the doubles and most of the singles to take an 11-4 lead. On the second day (cloudy and windy, with rain in the afternoon) the Irish won all the doubles and threatened to stage a dramatic recovery, but in the end achieved only an 8-7 advantage, to make it 18-12 to the Scots overall.
Glasgow Open 2012
A typical Glasgow Open weekend, very cold, dry, bright, saw about a dozen people including the manager ascend to Alexandra Park’s croquet lawns in Dennistoun. At least five rounds were pencilled in (I only use pen, but “penned in” does not work – I could just have said “planned”) with the option of a Final. Tony Brightman and John Surgenor were playing competitively for the first time for a few years, the others more often found on the Scottish circuit (that sounds grand ...).
The first round was settled by picking cards, with Richard Sparrow taking the spot to be filled by the vacationing Bill Spalding later in the day, to ensure nobody (except the manager) sat around to admire the view – or to try to get hot water.
Three close time-limited games set the tone – inter-activity (i.e. mistakes), rivalry, and a bit of friendly tension towards the end. After that, Swiss tournament rules were applied to set opponents for the following rounds, which showed Jane had settled in best (9-12-5 to beat John), and Campbell and Martin remembered how to swing the mallet productively.
Spring Weekend 2012
The first SCA tournament of 2012 was played in cool and breezy conditions at the Meadows Club. Saturday featured a good deal of sunshine, but Sunday was cloudy with some drizzle in the morning; the heaters in the pavilion remained in use throughout both days.
Sixteen entries had been accepted, and with double-banked games on three courts this meant that four players had late starts and there was usually some waiting between games. Despite this some people by playing on into the evening fitted four games into the first day: Jamieson Walker, who won all four of his, and Robert Inder, Fergus McInnes and Jola Jurasinska, who each had two wins and two losses. At the other extreme Alasdair Adam, who had had a late start, did not quite get his second game finished before having to leave to catch a bus. Those unbeaten on Saturday night, besides Jamieson, were Joe Lennon, with three wins, and Janice Duguid, who had two wins and was Alasdair's opponent in the adjourned game.