Compton Croquet Club member selected for England

Richard Platt of Eastbourne's Compton Croquet Club, located in the Saffrons Sports Ground, their current club champion and one of Compton's most experienced players, expressed his immense honour he felt at being part of the England team selected to play in the annual International Tournament between England and Scotland. A prestigious, long standing and highly competitive event in which the two sides compete for the Glasgow Quaich Trophy, a traditional Scottish two handled, silver drinking cup symbolising hospitality, trust, peace and unity. This year the event took place over the weekend of September 5/6th, hosted by the Croquet Club of Chester.

Play started on the Saturday morning in fine weather forecast for the weekend. With Chester Croquet Club's well known, extremely testing lawns, their uneven pace coupled with a gentle slope in places providing some interesting shot outcomes and a suitably stiff challenge for all of the extremely competent players taking part. Throughout the day the England team consistently mastered the conditions a degree better than the Scots, earning some good results. Winning all the morning's doubles and four of the afternoon's singles, taking forward a comforting overnight lead of 11/4 into Sunday.

After a very pleasant and enjoyable Saturday evening dinner enjoyed by the teams, Sunday's play continued in similar fashion. The Chester Club's lawns creating several tense, close finishes, the results not always going England 's way but unfortunately for the Scots, not nearly enough games won. The occasional Scottish success proving insufficient to counteract the increasing England dominance and finally for the England team, after again winning all of the morning's doubles, a couple of afternoon singles wins were all that were necessary to achieve the overall Tournament victory they had so keenly sought. The end result being England 17, Scotland 7. A somewhat one sided win perhaps but nevertheless, proudly regaining the Glasgow Quaich Trophy which had been held by Scotland for the previous three years. Richard making a significant contribution to the teams success by winning both of his doubles matches and two of his three singles.