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Premier croquet club in the South East.
2026 GC Veterans Championship
The 2026 GC Veterans Championship was won by top seed Tim Russell, who beat second seed Lionel Tibble 7-4, 7-5. This is the third time Tim has won the event in the last four years, two of those at Sussex where the competition has now come to the end of its three-year cycle.
Winner Tim Russell with Tournament Director Steve Leonard
Following the usual programme for this event, the 24 players were arranged into two blocks, each playing 11 single games over the first day and second morning, followed by a knockout and plate stage. Four players from Sussex County took part: Richard Brooks, Liz Farrow, David Dickins and Paul Green. Richard Brooks has played in every Veterans Championship since it start in 2007, with the exception of 2019 (playing the Worlds Qualifier elsewhere) and last year when personal reasons forced his withdrawal. Quite a record!
Weather conditions at Southwick were fine, if a little on the hot side. The lawns were fast, dry and challenging; a watering system fault had occurred 3 days before and over the weekend and that, coupled with the exceptionally dry weather and light winds left the lawns rather less controllable than Sussex’s superb groundsman Ben would have liked. The combination of hard ground and very firm Quadway hoops punished the slightest error in hoop running and many games were extended as good clearances and positioning were followed by failed hoops.
The format used by this competition since its inception means 11 block games over a day and a half. Quite challenging as nearly half the players were over 75. The first day ended with both Tim and Lionel winning 5/7 games, Tim losing to Nelson Morrow and Steve Leonard, and Lionel losing to Rick Lilley and Andy Dochniak.
Both Lionel and Tim went on to lead their respective blocks into the knockout stage, accompanied by the next four ranked players – Andy Dochniak, Steve Leonard, Andy Loakes and Stephen Custance-Baker; David Wise and Colin Britt (ranked 11 and 12) taking the last two places. Sadly, none of the club players made the cut this year and injury forced the withdrawal of Liz and David; Paul Green battled on in the Plate event and Richard acted as Tournament Referee for the remainder of the tournament.
Among the players over 75, only Stephen Custance-Baker survived into the Semi-Final stage and he was awarded the Richard Brooks Vase for the Best Performing Player in the age group. He also won the 3rd-4th place play-off. The (non-existent) Shield was won by Andy Loakes.
Stephen Custance-Baker, Brooks Vase winner
Andy Loakes, Shield winner
12 of the 16 possible players entered the Plate event which had a trophy this year, thanks to Croquet England who agreed to provide a freshly engraved new plate for this and future events. After some discussion with the players, the Manager ran it in a cross-block format as originally intended, with all participants playing opponents they had not yet met in the competition.
Many games were very long – not because of slow play (though there was some of that) but because every hoop was hard fought: lots of long clearances followed by defeat at the hands of unforgiving hoops. With hindsight it would probably have been wise to put a time limit on the plate matches, as this would have shortened the length of play on the second day and spared players long waits between games.
The Plate was won by Luis de Alarcon (Spain) who quietly won 5 out of 6 games, the best performance in the event. Luis said he had not played with Quadway hoops before and that clearly affected his performance on the crucial first day of the competition. Sadly, he was only able to go home with a photo of the award, rather than the Plate itself, as Croquet England doesn’t allow its trophies to travel abroad!
In his speech at the award, winner Tim Russell thanked the groundsman and catering teams for the excellent work making the tournament a great success.
On a personal note, it has been a pleasure managing the GC Veterans Championship at Sussex for the last three years. Tough, competitive play, but always in a good-natured and friendly way. The event is now off to Surbiton.
John Low
Littlehampton Centenary Competition
A sunny day with a warm breeze set the scene for Littlehampton’s annual Centenary invitational on Sunday 19th July.This popular day, ably managed by Bob and Robyn Clark, was as ever the perfect mix of socialising and some pretty competitive croquet.
Southwick’s team of Clive & Angela Jones, Sue Kilby and Linda Gavigan found the lawns a challenge in the first round but gained momentum as the day progressed to finished in a creditable 5th place out of 8 teams against some low handicaps.
Chichester took home the trophy for the 4th time in 5 years with Littlehampton in second place and Lodsworth third.
The Littlehampton members provided an outstanding display of delicious cakes for tea and an enormous raffle together with a quiz sheet to keep everyone busy during lulls between games which was won by Littlehampton because everyone else forgot to hand in their sheets!!
Linda Gavigan
Croquet England Short Croquet National Inter-club Championship
Having beaten Chichester & Fishbourne earlier this summer, Sussex County Croquet Club beat Guildford and Godalming Croquet Club 9-2 at Sussex County on 16 July 2026 for a place in the semi-finals where they will meet either High Wycombe or Bradford-on-Avon.
Detailed results (Sussex names first)
Nigel Billingham and Mike Akester (3.5) beat Peter Adams and Julie Tremble (3.5) 10-2
David Dickins (1.5) beat Richard Perkins (6) 14-13
Steve Chapman (2) beat Hilary Bird (8) 14-11
David Dickins beat Peter Adams (3) 14-9
Nigel Billingham (1.5) beat Julie Tremble (4) 14-5
Steve Chapman beat Richard Perkins 14-9
Mike Akester (6) lost to Hilary Bird 9-11
Mike Akester lost to Peter Adams 6-14
Steve Chapman beat Julie Tremble 14-12
Nigel Billingham beat Richard Perkins 14-9
David Dickins beat Hilary Bird 14-3
Gabrielle
Thanks to Gabrielle for organising the team
Sussex win Murphy Shield Quarter Final
On yet another hot and sunny day with no cooling breeze Sussex County welcomed our friends from Guildford & Godalming for a quarter-final match in the national Murphy Shield.
Ben and Nigel got us off to a good start, winning the doubles in two straight games. The two morning singles were long drawn out affairs, both going to 3 games with Jo winning hers against a 2 handicapper. 2-1 up at lunch.
Guildford & Godalming pulled one back straight after lunch and soon it was 3-3 with, as is so often the case, everything hinging on the final game.
We all sat down to watch as Jo took on Phil Tremble for the decider. Phil won the first game; the second went to the golden hoop with both players having chances to win. Jo eventually prevailed, setting up what might have been a nail-biting finish. However, a confident Jo took full control of the third game winning comfortably 7-2.
A 4-3 victory and an away semi-final against Phyllis Court or East Dorset.
Thanks to Ben, Nigel and Jo for playing and to Guildford and Godalming for the friendly spirit in which the tie was played.
Vincent
Sussex County Southern Challenge
The Southern Challenge is a GC competition run at and by Sussex County Croquet Club for local clubs.
It was a hot day, the hoops had been reset and were very tight making hooping difficult.
I had fortunately put time limits on all games which kept the tournament moving at an acceptable pace.
Although there was an imbalance of handicaps - Bromley and Canterbury averaging 7 & 8 handicaps while Sussex County averaged 1 - the tournament finished very close and it was the last round victory (their first of the afternoon) of Canterbury over Hove Beach that gave the victory to Sussex County for the second year running.
Hove Beach were second and Sussex County 2 were third.
Tournament result
1st Sussex County 1 3 wins + 24 hoops
2nd Hove Beach 3 wins +15 hoops
3rd Sussex county 2 3 wins +5 hoops
4th Lodsworth 2 wins + 2 hoops
5th Bromley 2 wins - 12 hoops
6th Canterbury 1 win - 31 Hoops
Thanks to Roger for managing the event.
Sussex County Open Singles – 15 July
A beautiful day welcomed 32 players for the latest one-day singles competition. 11 entrants attended from clubs outside of SCCC, notably, Nelson Morrow who was over from New Zealand and Debbie and Steve Hayns from the Isle of Wight. Divisions A, B, D and E all had 6 players, each playing 5 games. Division C had 8 players, so was split into two groups of four playing 3 games in the morning, with play-offs in the afternoon to decide the overall winner.
The conditions were challenging: high temperatures, a moderate breeze, fast lawns and uncompromising hoops. It was decided, therefore, to limit games to 50 minutes, without which, I suspect, we would have been playing well into the evening.
Division A came down to a final game playoff between Brian Aikens and Konstantin Yudintsev, both of whom had won three of their first four games. Konstantin prevailed 5-3 to win the group, and elevating Simon Ancell into second on net hoops.
Division B was won convincingly by Richard Brooks, just to show the organiser that he should have been in Division A really! Paul Green had an excellent day, finishing second in a field of lower handicappers.
The Division C Final was contested by Mike Gentry and Beryl Hughes, both of whom had come through from Block C2. Mike had won all his games to this point, and the final went with form; Mike prevailing 7-5.
Division D was hard fought, with 1 win separating the top four players. In the end, Peter Hill came out on top, with Sue Nicholas in second.
Division E was equally tight, but Tony Majoram took the title, with David Larkin in second. Commiserations to Jim Mander who broke his mallet early on, providing him with yet another hurdle to overcome on the day.
Thank you to everybody who made it such a good natured and enjoyable day.
David
Thanks to David for managing the event
U League vs Ealing
On 10th July we hosted Ealing for our final U league fixture of 2026.
Today’s team ( Chrissie, Steve , Tony and Nigel ), seen in photo below with our opposition did as all our U league teams have done for two years won ( 5-2) and once again finished with a 4-0 win record for the season.
It was a tough day for both teams fighting both the incessant heat as well as hoops that had recently been reset for the Inter Counties at what seemed like impossible widths ( I’m sure the top players will have none of the problems we all encountered 😉).
The morning session ended 2-1 to SCCC with Steve and Nigel both winning their singles and in the afternoon session Steve, Tony and Nigel all triumphed.
A big thank you to all players that volunteered for this years squad and lets look forward to another successful year next year.
Nigel Billingham
Sussex beat Canterbury in R League
Sussex Pilgrims beat Canterbury ( Result of today's R League match away July 13th)
Our team of Jo Crosby, Kathy McColgan, Davide Cogrossi, Mike Akester overnighted in Kent. Captain Mike prostrated himself in the Cathedral before the shrine and then took inspiration from Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales”.
Their captain collected Mike from his hotel. Their Lawns were slow and patchy but the superb lunch had us Pilgrims happy and content.
Jo & Mike won the doubles 2-1. Kathy won 1…lost one. Mike lost his singles with their No5, Jo drew her singles. But our Jude Bellingham was Davide Cogrossi who won both his games.
Sussex 4.5…..Canterbury 2.5.
Mike Akehurst
AC 2-legged Competition
The 2-Legged AC event was held on 3rd July. The first try out of this type of event: 2 players per team, 2 rounds, 2 legs each round! All matches 14 points, with each round consisting of an alternate stroke doubles, and a singles. Some advanced singles did take place which was interesting to see for high bisquers.
Lovely weather so we got all the rounds in. There were 2 points for a win, bonus 2 points for pegging out, 1 point for a draw.
Good to see Gabrielle, Alan Cottle and Clive playing to support higher handicappers.
Times were limited, maybe too strictly,a as most games did not peg out! A lesson for the next time!
The winners were Bob and Robyn Clark with 12 points, followed by Simon and Margaret from Ealing with 6 points, and Clive and Tony also with 6 points. So Bob and Robyn received the chocolate bars from Chairman Clive.
Many thanks to all who played and supported. Plenty of ideas emerged from the play, particularly, tactical, so we will have to try and assist players to improve their standard and understanding of the game.
Thanks to the AC referees and the ROT Gabrielle.
Frances (Manager and Organiser)
And thanks to Frances for arranging the event.
Croquet South East GC Ladies Day
The 2026 SE Fed GC Ladies Day was held at Southwick on Wednesday 1st July with a full house of 14 teams competing for the trophy.
Congratulations to Chichester for winning the tournament by just 1 game, with last year's winners Dulwich in 2nd place and Hove Beach 3rd. Well done to Sussex County who finished 5th. The team, captained brilliantly by Rosemary W, consisted of Sandra, Angela A, Linda F, Sue K and Rachel P.
It was good to see so many familiar faces back and also to welcome new ones to Southwick. Returning players were all very complimentary about our new clubhouse.
We probably couldn't have asked for better weather conditions, mostly sunny, but not as hot as last week!
Many thanks to everyone who helped with the day, in the kitchen and the bar, cake makers, and a special thanks to Bob Clark for acting as referee of the tournament and for all his help on the all-important spreadsheet keeping track of the results. Thanks also to David Larkin for acting as referee on the day and Linda for her work on the bell and hooter.
Jo, Diana and Nira
Last import : 26/07/2026 01:00