PENDLE & CRAVEN CROQUET CLUB Now that the croquet season 2025 is in full swing, report from clubs are flooding in from all levels of tournament. A very busy month has been reported from the Pendle & Craven Croquet Club, who have started their season well by winning their first Murphy Shield match, and encouraging competitive play with some new tournaments. Read this latest report from the club, by Libby Dixon. MURPHY SHIELD The Murphy Shield is an Inter Club knockout competition for Golf Croquet; each team of four players must have an aggregate GC handicap of at least 8. Today the Pendle & Craven Team were victorious over Ashby
Croquet Club. The team of Mike Bradbury, Libby Dixon, Andrew Gould and Paul Dowdall travelled down on Wednesday afternoon staying overnight so as to be fresh for a full day’s play. The weather was unseasonably hot (the warmest 1st May on record). Our hosts provided an excellent lunch along with cool drinks. The result was a 5‐1 win for Pendle & Craven.
The ultimate winner with 5wins out of 6 games was Leigh Dixon who triggered to an 11. The manager was thanked for running the Tournament by all the players. The manager thanked all the ground staff and volunteers for all their hard work in watering the lawns so there was grass to play on and setting up the lawns. C”ADVANTAGE GC TOURNAMENT 3RD MAY As an experiment Pendle and Craven Croquet Club introduced a “C” Advantage GC competition into their Tournament programme. Pendle and Craven CC welcomed
Simon A from Bury Croquet Club and Brenda K from Crake Valley Croquet Club, along with four club members. The day was very cool and despite periods of sunshine the temperature only reached 10deg. Players gathered by 8.45am and after a managers briefing, time was allowed for a warm up on the lawns.
“D” LEVEL GC SERIES “D” Level series was held on 3rd May 2025. This is a new exciting addition to the CE fixtures calendar to @encourage new players to develop their skills. There were 7 entries with only one other club represented, Fylde. After the managers briefing at 9.00 am and a warm up, play commenced at 9.15. All the competitors were finding the cold conditions difficult after the previous few hot days. Many had not enough layers but managed to warm up with hot drinks. It was an all play all format with one competitor sitting out each round. The games flowed freely with no game taking longer than 1 hour. Everyone commented on how surprised they were to enjoy the experience and it was fun. For the majority it was the first Tournament they had ever played. Many games were fiercely fought with six 7/6 games. In the afternoon the sun came out briefly which had everyone hoping for higher temperatures. Afternoon tea was enjoyed watching the last match to finish.
In an all‐play‐all , no time limits , and using the Advantage 2024/25 framework, play got underway. Despite the initial fear of long games the players played expeditiously. No game went past 45 mins. At lunch everyone gathered in the clubhouse to warm up. Chatter centered on croquet and forthcoming competitions for C class players. The afternoon went without any problems and the clear winner was Sharon D with 4 wins out of 5 games. Sharon was presented with her trophy by Libby D (Tournament Manager). Competitors all reported they enjoyed the friendly atmosphere and the competition.
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