Club

Croquet

Wrest Park

GC Handicap League 2025

Wrest Park has entered teams in all three GC leagues: Open, B level (3+) and Handicap. The Handicap League is divided into four areas. Wrest Park are one of eight teams in the Western area along with Northampton and two teams each from Leighton-Linslade, Stony Stratford and Watford. Details and results can be found in the Leagues pages on the EACF website (see Useful Links).

v Enfield (E) (semi-final at Watford)     13 September     lost 5-13

report by Peter Rothwell

After qualifying for the knock-out stages by winning the Western Division league the team travelled to Watford (a neutral venue) to take on Enfield in the semi-final.  Or at least three of us did; the fourth team member mistakenly thought it was a home game and had to be redirected back down south by Tim Brewer who was setting up for the AC Tournament!

On arrival at Cassiobury Park in Watford, court 1 was covered in huge worm casts (they grow their worms big in Watford it seems) but luckily the match was taking place on courts 3 and 4 which had kindly been swept and prepared by Geoff Johnson who was also manager for the day.

Representing WP were Peter Rothwell (2), Gill Brewer (5), Tony Meredith (6) and Chris Harrison (7)

Enfield’s team was Thomas Halliday (2), Colin Carver (4), Rob Havill (10), and Chris Twomey (12).

The prize for the winning team would be a place in the final against either Unity or Colchester (in fact Colchester as it turned out), due to be played at Wrest Park on 27 September.

The initial round of doubles saw Gill and Tony paired against Colin and Chris T and the WP duo made swift work of it with a convincing 7-1 win, despite starting on -1 to their opponents’ zero.

In the other doubles, with Chris H still on his way back from WP, Peter had to start solo against Thomas and Rob, with Chris’s ball sitting alone in the starting area in corner 4 being repeatedly deemed until he arrived.  Despite being a single ball against two, with the benefit of winning the toss Peter managed to win two of the first four hoops before Chris arrived to join the fray at hoop 5.  Thereafter a tightly fought and quite long game eventually went to the golden hoop but the Enfield pair emerged victorious, so the doubles were shared.

Four rounds of handicap singles were then played, in the normal league match format.  In the first round Peter was up against Thomas who had represented Scotland in last year’s GC Singles World Championship and took a game off Reg Bamford in the block stage!  Thomas played some excellent shots on the way to a well-deserved 7-3 win, including a perfectly executed “bouncing bomb” jump shot from about15 yards to run hoop 2 over Peter’s ball which was only a yard in front of the hoop, and clearing a ball in tight position in front of hoop 4 by smashing his own ball through the hoop backwards from the south boundary after Peter had cleared him to a wired position.  The other three games in this round also went to Enfield who therefore took a 5 to 1 match lead.  The second round of singles was a much more even affair with Peter convincingly beating Colin 7-2 from a starting score of -2 to 0 and Gill beat Thomas 7-3 from a starting score of 2 to 0, but Tony and Chris H could not quite overcome their opponents’ starting advantages and both lost by 7-5.  The match score therefore stood at 7 to 3 in favour of Enfield at the lunch break.

After lunch, the third set of singles was also shared with Peter starting at 0-3 against Rob but winning by 7-4 and Tony holding on to a 3 hoop starting advantage to beat Thomas by 7-5, but Gill and Chris H lost to Chris T and Colin respectively.  With the score now 9 to 5, in an 18 game match, WP’s only hope was to win all 4 of the last round of singles and benefit from a superior total hoops scored.  All of the WP team fought bravely with two of the final games going to a golden hoop, including Peter v Chris T where Chris benefited from a 5 hoop starting lead but all four games eventually went to Enfield meaning that they won the match by a final score of 13 games to 5.  Individual wins earned three of the Enfield team a handicap reduction.

Some delicious cake and a cup of tea made up slightly for the disappointment of WP not being able to reach the final with home advantage, but overall it was a successful year for the GC handicap team.  Thanks to all who played during the season and shared in our success.


v Watford B (home)     15 August     won 10-8

report by Tim Brewer

Wrest Park: Peter Rothwell (3), Tim Brewer (3), Tony Meredith (6), John Kirkham (11)

Watford B: Lois Hall (8), Howard Jones (10), Clive Fenton (11), John Suckling (11)

The team faced a significant challenge as the cumulative handicaps for the respective teams pre match were: Watford B – 38 & WP – 23. However, on checking the handicap cards prior to starting the match, two Watford players required a handicap change giving Watford a cumulative handicap of 40! WP therefore faced a number of challenging starting scores on very tricky lawns and tight hoops.

Honours were shared equally in the two doubles games. Round 1 of the singles games was also completed on equal footing. So all square going to lunch (this was 1.00 p.m., illustrating the challenging playing conditions). Lunch obviously regenerated the WP team as we had a clean sweep of games in round 2. Round 3 was shared equally so WP were 9 – 5 up going into round 4 – only one more win needed. Round 4 saw Watford rise to the challenge winning the first three games to finish. This left Peter Rothwell to win his last game from a starting score of -3:1.  He clinched the victory on the 15th hoop winning 7-6. The final game finished about 6.30 p.m. – a long day in the hot sun and 30 degree heat!

The importance of having a referee present was highlighted by a number of faults and requests for rule confirmation. One example of note for anyone involved in playing Advantage croquet is to be aware of the correct order of hoops once you get beyond hoop 13 i.e. the order is hoop 3 for hoop 13, hoop 4 for hoop 14, hoop 1 for hoop 15, hoop 2 for hoop 16, hoop 11 for hoop 17, hoop 12 for hoop 18 and then hoop 3 for hoop 19 and repeat for extreme handicap differences. The penalty for both sides contesting a hoop out of order is to discount any points scored on incorrect hoops, resetting the game back to the last correctly run hoop and then restarting the game from one of the two penalty areas. A coin is tossed and the loser decides the penalty area to use and the winner plays first with either of their balls. This occurred on the deciding hoop of one of the games!

Congratulations to the team on a hard fought match win, which puts WP top of the Western Division table on 10 points. Watford A and Stony Stratford Blues are yet to play. If Watford A win they will be second in the division but if Stony Stratford Blues win they will be equal on points with WP. However, their net game difference is +2 whereas WP is +16. So barring an unlikely whitewash of Watford A, we stand a good chance of being the Western Division champions.


v Watford A (away)     8 August     won 10-8

Several matches had already been played before this great win, which left Wrest Park at the top of the table with one round left. At the time of writing WP and Stony Stratford Blues both have eight points with game differences of +14 and +2 respectively. Third and fourth are Watford A and Watford B, both on seven points with game differences of +12 and +4. There are two points for a win and one for a draw.

In the final round WP play Watford B, SS Blues play Watford A and Watford B play Watford A, so there are several possible outcomes. Depending on the order the games are played, the match between the Watford teams might need to be watched closely!

Wrest Park: Michael Tideswell (4), Gill Brewer (5), Tony Meredith (6), Chris Harrison (7)

Watford A: Mike Grossmith (7), Frank Skinner (7), Ron Hibbs (9), Georgie Jones (10)

Wrest Park won both doubles games and took the first round of singles 3-1 to establish a 5-1 lead. The second round finished 2-2 and Watford made a clean sweep in the third round to level the score at 7-7, but Wrest Park fought back to take the final round 3-1 for a winning score of 10-8. All we can do now is win our final match and hope that the other results fall our way.

v Northampton (away)     11 April     won 10-8  

l-r Michael Tideswell, John Kirkham, Peter Rothwell, Gill Brewer, Diana Dunkley, Paul Chard (match referee), Lizzie Brown, Alison Chard, Steve Dawson

A winning start for Wrest Park, for whom Peter Rothwell and John Kirkham were playing in their first ever GC league match.

© Wrest Park Croquet Club

l-r Rob Havill, Chris Harrison, Colin Carver, Tony Meredith, Chris Twomey, Gill Brewer, Thomas Halliday, Peter Rothwell