CLUB HISTORY
2010 -
Our teams have a little more success than in 2009, but nothing too exciting. However, some individual notable successes in 2010 are Mick Greagsby winning the Pat Apple trophy in California, Aaron Westerby captaining New Zealand at the MacRobertson Shield, Alex Jardine "victor of the seeds’ graveyard quarter" in the Southwick Salver and winning Ramsgate Advanced Weekend, Jon Diamond being second in Southwick Midsummer and winning our Open Golf Handicap Tournament. Alex Jardine and Jon Diamond represent Kent at the InterCounties.
David Evans joins as our new Lawn Manager and we're upgrading our Club House facilities with lockers and electric hand dryers. We run the first Finals Day for some years, which is declared a success.
Carolyn Gunstone and Kate Sander joined the Committee, replacing Elaine Houslop and Roger Morris.
Miriam Reader, a long standing member and sometime Committee member, dies in December and leaves us a bequest.
2011 was nothing special, with our SECF teams having even less success (despite one of our away opponent's being Ryde, Isle of Wight, and having to visit us!). The lawns are still in good condition as we acquire yet another Groundsman, Ray Kemp, early in the year. Still, a new competition that succeeded well was an internal Golf teams held on a Tuesday evening, won by Mick Greagsby's team.
None of our players won any of our external tournaments, but notable was a player from Uruguay who won our Open Golf, and promised to donate a cup for next year. John Hobbs won the Over 75 class at the National Veterans, so now holds the Pidcock mallet trophy!
Our new flag and banner got a paid outing to Hever - hopefully some new members in future (and a return visit in 2012), and we can report that two of our members, Richard Smith and Jo Wadman, got married.
2012: Mick Belcham retires as Secretary, after 10 years! Sadly, we also have to report the death of Peter Howell. He was our Chairman for 16 years and had retired to Budleigh Salterton in 2001.
Our teams have a bit more success again, with the Golf Handicap team winning more than 50%. [The Association Advanced team again failed to win a match...] However, we have a stonking result at the inaugural SECF Southern Challenge, coming 4th.
Individual external success was achieved by Jon Diamond, winning our own Golf Open tournament and also the Compton Open Championship.
The weather is so awful that, despite retaining our groundsman, the lawns are not as good as we'd like and even worse - we don't manage to get any Autumn maintenance done, so the prospects for 2013 aren't good either.
Our Winter programme prospers though, with the One Ball now a firm favourite with 16 players on one occasion.
Well, despite our fears, the lawns in 2013 were in quite good condition during the year. We're still without a Secretary, but in this electronic age this isn't so much of a handicap as it used to be, and Bob Bruce volunteers part-way through the year.
We didn't enter the GC top Level Play League, as we looked like being outclassed. (We were in the Advanced League, coming bottom again.) However, our other teams did quite well - we won the GC Restricted League and also the SECF GC Team Doubles event. Our Southern Challenge team didn't quite succeed as well as in 2012, coming 7th of 10 teams in the top division.
Thankfully we managed to undertake our full Autumn maintenance, although rain subsequently prevented us from re-opening for more than 6 weeks.
2014 saw a few returning members and the membership up to 55,
with a new Introduction to Croquet course being run
successfully.
We finally achieve our first win in the AC Advanced League
after 4 years and actually make it 2/4! We don't do well in the
other leagues, but at least win games in each of them.
Alex Jardine wins the Honeygrove Cup and Martin Lester a
Handicap event at Cheltenham.
The Finals Day ran successfully again and we managed One Ball
throughout the Winter.
The 2015 season started with a bang and 25 players on Opening
Day. It continued well and saw a new record for membership, now
up to 62 with a good number of AC beginners, thanks to a new
Coaching plan and Saturday AC sessions.
Our performance in the SECF Leagues wasn't brilliant with only
our Golf Handicap team scoring more than 50%, finishing 5th out
of 16, and we came 7th again in the Southern Challenge.
Barney Lewis came 3rd in the Regional Final for the CA All
England Handicap, narrowing missing out on getting to the
National Final. Jon
Diamond won our own Golf Open tournament again, with
Martin Lester winning the Pegasus Plate.
The season ended with a very busy Finals Day, with only a
couple of matches not played on the day and Mark Houslop being
specially busy.
Unfortunately the weather interfered with our Autumn
Maintenance and with almost continuous rains the lawns barely
re-opened. However, a Bonfire's Night party at Kate Sanders was
fantastic with lots of bangs!
2016 was another good season (our 50th as it subsequently
transpires). Our efforts for National Croquet Day produced 35
visitors and even one member. Membership continued to increase,
up to another record at 66.
Jon Diamond won the Pegasus Plate, but didn't perform well in
the other external tournaments he entered and neither did anyone
else.
We probably ought to draw veil over over performance in SECF
events and leagues too.
Richard Mann chickened out on Finals Day, he had some excuse
about playing in the CA All England Regional Final, but the rest
of the matches were almost all played in front of a decent crowd
of spectators. The only outstanding one was the Hunter Plate,
which ran out of time as Jon Diamond was in three other
finals...
Copyright © Royal Tunbridge Wells Croquet Club 2003 -