The eighth playing of the Centenary Cup took place at Playstreet Lane last weekend 12th & 13th July in glorious weather. The original entries included eight visitors, including Cliff Jones from the Croquet Academy, Carole Jackson, David Hopkins and Graham Thompson (all Compton), Keith and Maggie Webb (West Worthing), Richard Jenkins (Hamptworth) and Chris Roberts (Phyllis Court). Unfortunately a couple were unable to attend but thanks to the strength in depth of Ryde members, two replacements were found at short notice. Carole Jackson (0) was seeded 1 with Ryde’s Roy Tillcock (1) as last year’s winner being seeded 2. Under Cliff Jones‘(1) management, the entries were divided into two blocks of eight with all playing all in 13 hoop games on Saturday. Not content with that, a full programme also included the first game in the quarter finals for the championship qualifiers.
Perhaps surprisingly, Carole lost her opening game to Nick Westmore (4) but was very decisive in the remainder winning 6 out of 7. Roy Tillcock managed the same, although losing 4-7 to Richard Harris (3) but making sure of his place in the qualifying draw. Stuart Peters (2) also managed six wins and the other qualifiers were Cliff Jones, with 5, Richard Harris, Dave Willett and John Sim with 4. On Sunday morning the best of three quarter finals were completed with none of them going beyond two games. Going through to the semi finals, Carole met Cliff and won 7-5, 7-6, while in a local derby match Roy beat stuart 7-5, 6-7, 7-5. Meanwhile in the play-offs, Dave Willet beat John Sim 7-6, 4-7, 7-5 and Keith Webb beat Richard Harris 1-7, 7-2, 7-5. In a long hard fought final, Carole won the first game 7-3 and seemed to have put her stamp on the match but Roy clawed his way back and equalised 7-5 and then won the decider by the same score to retain his championship.
The tournament is a qualifying event for the National Golf Croquet Championships (aka The Ascot Cup), which will be played at Ryde on 20th and 21st September. Having decided not to compete in 2013, Roy has now booked his place in that event and we wish him every success. In the playoff for third and fourth place, Stuart Peters continued his run of success beating Cliff Jones 7-5, 3-7, 7-6. Keith Webb was 5th, Dave Willett 6th, Richard Harris 7th and John Sim 8th while Jim O’Keeffe won the plate and reduced his handicap from 5 to 4.
Richard Harris