After a truly entertaining weekend of knockout play, the 2023 WCF Women’s Golf Croquet World Championship is now down to a final between England’s Rachel Gee and Jamie Gumbrell from Australia. The final will take place Monday morning at the Sussex County Croquet Club in Southwick, England. The first session live stream should be available at this link.
JAMIE GUMBRELL. PHOTO BY ANDREW MOSS.
The weekend offered all kinds of great action, but one of the highlights was certainly Gumbrell’s relentless march to the final. After a 6-0 match record in Block H, she took only one game loss in the knockout and now boasts a 19-4 overall game record in the event and a perfect 10-0 match record. To earn her place in the final, she battled Egypt’s Maram Nabil and got through with a 7-4, 7-4, 7-5 win. Nabil was fresh off a 3-2 win in the quarterfinals over Pouline Salib (EGY) that saw her come back from down 2-0.
Gee’s path to the finals started in Block E, where she notched a perfect 6-0 match record with a game record of 12-0. In the knockout, she did have a tight battle with Debbie Lines (ENG) in round 2, but prevailed 7-4, 5-7, 7-5. In the quarterfinals, she went up against New Zealand’s Jenny Clarke and pulled away after game one with a 7-6, 7-1, 7-0 final. That earned her a spot in the semifinals against defending Women’s Champion Soha Moustafa (EGY) as her opponent.
The semifinal was the featured live stream on Sunday and it lived up to the billing. Gee pushed out to a 2-0 match lead and in game three, she was looking to close the door as she pushed out to a 4-2 lead. But Moustafa battled back and took games 3 and 4 to force the decider.
In game five Moustafa’s momentum continued and she built a commanding 5-2 lead. This time it was Gee’s turn to claw her way back and she did that by taking hoops eight and nine to get to 5-4. Moustafa took H10. Gee then prevailed after good battles at 11 and 12 to get to the 13th hoop. A lengthy battle ensued there and after a long clear with red on black for Moustafa, Gee slipped and angled one-yarder through to advance.
