WELCOME
It has been my absolute pleasure to bring Talking Croquet to all of you since its first issue in May 2025. Since then, we have also taken the initiative to make the Croquet Gazette a publicly available magazine and all our magazines can now be viewed online. Talking Croquet has proved incredibly popular with readers all around the world as well as our players registered with Croquet England. I am so very proud that each magazine receives over three thousand visitors, with the highest viewed being our March 2026 issue which received 5,303 readers from when it was published. What has also become clear is that the content in Talking Croquet, which has always been a little less formal than that within the Croquet Gazette, has been well received encouraging far more interaction and general interest. Stories from the Grass Roots of our sport have been of particular interest, along with the sharing of coaching techniques from the swing clinic and stories from our friends Chris and Anne at DB Mallets. With the use of statistics provided by our software we can now confirm that these articles are of much higher popularity to our wider readership, with the detailed tournament reports now becoming less popular across our membership. The future of the Croquet Gazette will therefore be guided by the popularity of Talking Croquet. This change in direction for our players’ magazines aligns to our ‘One Croquet’ philosophy. It is vital that we understand, appreciate and deliver what everyone within our community would like to see, whether they are players of Croquet for fun, for friendship or for competition. We are privileged to have a sport which is truly accessible, which can be shared with friends and family, and can be a welcome activity for so many others from so many different communities. I hope that our now public magazines will help bring us closer to those who haven’t yet heard of our sport, and to those to whom our sport can bring joy and challenge. Thank you so much to all of you who have read Talking Croquet, interacted by sending your comments, writing letters and sharing images and articles. Please continue to share the tournament reports which will be published online, and any stories or matters of interest which you feel could be shared with our ever-growing population of players and volunteers. Alison
Talking Croquet Issue 009 | September 2026
Front Cover: Day Outing to Brodsworth Hall (Doncaster) Croquet Club (Letters page 11) CONTENTS
4 Chief Executive's Column 6 Coaching Awards 7 A triumphant return 9 Okay Croquet 10 Letters to the Editor
12 Yorkshire Federation AC Doubles 13 Tyneside AC Advanced Weekend 13 Final League Match at Downham 14 AC Open Championship 15 GC Open Championship 16 Sidmouth's GC B Level & SiSter 18 Cheltenham Barter Trophy 19 Barbara Young Memorial Trophy 20 Bisque Bundles 21 Alternative One-Day Format
Alison Maugham Editor editor@croquetengland.org.uk
www.croquetengland.org.uk | 3
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