GC English National Singles Championship
by Richard Bilton The English National Singles Championship was back at Nottingham this year, where the lawns and hoops were very well prepared, and both stood up well to the tremendous amount of rain on Saturday night and Sunday. Jack Good, fresh from his victory at the GC First Eight a few weeks earlier, was strong favourite. Some matches were closer than expected, but he came through them all nonetheless, and became the English National Singles Champion. In the first round of block play, Good’s match against Dominic Aarvold was extremely close as each game went to hoop 13, and he did well to win. Lionel Tibble and David Thirtle‐Watts also went to three games, but Tibble won an easy third game. Another match unexpectedly went to three games, as Tony Butcher took the middle game against Stephen Mulliner. Ian Burridge had no difficulty in winning against Mike Bilton. Stuart Smith has a habit of not starting well, and lost the first game against Andrew Hobbs, before winning the next two. Nick Archer came through a tough match against Richard Brooks. Block D was by far the youngest, with three players under 30. Their first round did not take long, as the first game in both matches was won 7‐0. In fact, as they were on the same court, and only one side was using clips, there were 16 hoops scored on that court before a clip was used. Richard Bilton lost 2 hoops at the start of game 2, but still scored 7 hoops in a row twice against Louise Smith. Callum Johnson lost 3 hoops to Albie Willett. Block D went straight into the next round, but this took considerably longer. L Smith took advantage of Willett’s unexpected misses in game 1, and played well to come through the subsequent closer games. The length of this match held up the other and R Bilton didn’t get going against Johnson. Good took an easy first game against Tibble, and came back from behind to win game 2. Aarvold comfortably beat Thirtle‐Watts in 2. S Smith was in form against Archer, and Brooks didn’t provide much challenge to Hobbs. The match between Butcher and M Bilton was a similar story, but with the seeds the other way around. Mulliner had a good long battle with an in‐form Burridge, and eventually came through at the deciding hoop in game 3. In the final round, Good had his fifth hoop 13 of the day, but beat Thirtle‐Watts in 2. Aarvold did the same in beating Tibble to reach the knockout, and Archer replicated that scoreline against Hobbs to get through. S Smith repeated his round 2 performance against Brooks. Johnson was the only player to have not lost a game all day after beating L Smith. Willet could have got through if he hadn’t let the first game against R Bilton slip, as he then took game 2, but his form dipped and he lost game 3. Burridge had a convincing win over Butcher to progress to the knockout. After his first two matches took three long games, Mulliner comfortably beat M Bilton in 2, although was still last to finish.
Players arrived at the club on Sunday expecting the lawns to be littered with puddles after the downpour on Saturday night. To their surprise, there was only a small section of the south boundary with a slight squelch. The rest of the lawns held up well in the light rain in the morning. It wasn’t until the heavy rain later in the day that led to standing water on all courts. In the quarter‐finals, the match between Good and Burridge was the quickest, not only because it was the only match of the round that didn’t go to three games, but because Good won 7‐4, 7‐0. Although Johnson and Archer did go to three games, none of their games went past hoop 10. Johnson was brilliant in game 2, but Archer was very solid and won 7‐ 3, 2‐7, 7‐3. Aarvold was arguably the better player in his match, finishing with better net hoops, but Mulliner narrowly pinched it 7‐6, 3‐7, 7‐6. Every game between Smith and Bilton was close, one way or another. Smith was middling everything in game 3 and Bilton found himself 6‐2 down, and noticeably changed his approach and shot at everything – including running hoop 10 from hoop 9 – and managed to get a shot at hoop 13 from the boundary, but missed and Smith won 7‐5, 6‐7, 7‐6. Archer’s momentum continued to swing into the semi‐finals, as he lost the first game to Mulliner but dominated the next. Both played well in game 3, but Mulliner’s tenacity won him the match 7‐3, 2‐7, 7‐5. Good followed up his first round win with another comfortable result. He was tested in the first game, but not in the second, and beat Smith 7‐5, 7‐2. It was at this point that the heavens opened, and very playable conditions soon became underwater. Fortunately, the weather forecast was correct and it only last around half an hour. Once it eased off, players took turns to brush the water off the court. Puddles kept reappearing even once the final had started, but the final continued while players used their mallets to sweep the water off the boundary. It looked like the final was going to follow a similar pattern for Good after he took the first game without difficulty. The second game was much closer as the players kept alternating hoops, but Mulliner’s experience showed as he gained and maintained a lead throughout. However, he was unable to sustain that level of consistency and found himself 6‐4 down in game 3. He earned a shot at hoop 11 after effecting a miss from Good, but only ran it by a foot. However, even with all the rain, positional shots were still being overhit, and Good over approached hoop 12. A few rotations later, and Mulliner opted to play in rather than shoot at Good’s significantly angled hoop shot. Not necessarily always a bad choice, but it was in this case, as Good calmly sent his ball through and won the match 7‐3, 5‐ 7, 7‐5 to become the newest winner of the Ascot Cup.
Continued on page 27
www.croquetengland.org.uk | 26
Made with FlippingBook. PDF to flipbook with ease