Croquet News Clips: Croquet Shirt, Egyptian Open and Wine & Wickets

Designer Duncan Quinn has unleashed a "croquet shirt" on the world. Other than the one on the left being predominantly white, I'm not sure what would classify these as croquet shirts. I suppose they look comfortable, but ultimately I'd suggest a modification. You can keep the pink trim on the white, but I'd also offer four more versions with blue, red, black and yellow trim for each. Again, the mention of Adrien Grenier makes me think that some how, some way, HBO is going to come after my Entourage script based on Ari Gold being a closet, elite-level six-wicket player. Also, I better mention our own Croquet Network Store for those who like to bring a little humor to their fashion on the court.

The Egyptians once again showed their dominance in golf croquet. Sherif Nafaa claimed the 5th Egyptian Open by defeating 21-year-old Ahmed Yasser 2-7,  7-,6  7-6,   5-7,  7-5. It must have been a thrilling match, but I'd be curious to know how long this final series lasted. Nafa earned $2000 (U.S.) for the win. More details are available over several new items on the WCF website.

Wine, Wickets and Wheels, oh my. The Hayes Croquet Club continues to push the envelope for aggressive growth and marketing of the game as they are planning several croquet events to be weaved into a July 1-4 celebration at the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center near Fremont, Ohio. As it has been recently brought to the attention of the croquet world that the Presidential Center contains a massive collection of croquet books and artifacts, the Hayes Club was formed roughly one year ago to acknowledge the collection and already boasts 40 members that play weekly on the lawns at the center. Now, they are promoting this Wine, Wickets & Wheels event. It seems like a massive undertaking and the best way to understand it is to check out the details on the CroquetWorld website.

Croquet News Clips: John Prince Cartoon, Egyptian Open and 50

John Prince illustrationIf you follow the Nottingham Board List, the above cartoon will probably amuse you. Beyond on that you should check out this web page on the John Prince (scroll down) that has all kinds of croquet illustrations.

Sometimes it seems like Egypt is the heart of croquet. Sure, Great Britain is pretty much the dominant force, but check out this quote from the WCF site on the Egyptian Open.

Yesterday at a Press Conference Members of the Egyptian Croquet Federation Board and WCF President answered questions for about an hour on subjects ranging from the strength of Egypts players, how croquet is developing into new countries, funding for international events and development of croquet in Egypt.

I haven't heard the word press conference associated with croquet much here in the states.

If you want to impress me, put 50 years in the game. Muriel Woodward, 87, and Eileen Trenwith
from the Yorke Peninsula in Australia were honored for 52 and 50 years respectively as members of the Moonta Croquet Club.

“I love it and I just enjoyed playing," Woodward said. "I didn’t go out there expecting to win. I just wanted to enjoy the game. I used to go away to tournaments and always take a beginner as a partner. I like teaching others and passing on my love for the game.”

This certainly highlights one of the many benefits of croquet and I love the passion they show for the game.

Upcoming Tournaments / October-November 2009

OCTOBER 2009

Oct 02-03 / Mallet Mayhem 09 (9-Wicket)
Rockford, IL / www.tinkercottage.com

Oct 08-11 / Country Boys Croquet Tournament
Lexington, NC / Danny Huneycutt - (336-764-4554) huney1322@triad.rr.com

Oct 15-18 / Texas Croquet Classic (US)
Dallas, TX / Bob Knowlton - robertk@baylorhealth.edu (214.750.8722)

Oct 20-25 / Coastal Croquet Clubs Fall Invitational (US)
Hilton Head, SC / Avril Nicholson - avril@sc.rr.com (843.705.2929)

Oct 22-25 / Selection Eights (AC)
West Palm Beach, FL / Rich Lamm - richlamm@comcast.net or Jerry Stark - TPRover@aol.com

Oct 23–25 / Jekyll Island Invitational
Jekyll Island, GA / Dan Lott - lott1965@bellsouth.net (912.506.8744)

Oct 29-Nov 1 / West Indies Croquet Championship (US?)
St. Croix, VI / Les Kelley - lkelley@nnldlaw.com (340.773.9363)

Oct 30- Nov 1 / SCCC Fall Invitational (Singles Only) (US?)
Venice, FL / Jackie Jones - crokpeople@aol.com (941.484.3206)

NOVEMBER 2009

Nov 04–08 / Royal Palm Yacht & Country Club 13th Croquet Invitational
Boca Raton, FL / Norma Truman, TM - (561-368-9291) tntboca@aol.com

Nov 08–14 / USCA National Championships
Rancho Mirage, CA / Erica Sherman - (561-478-0760) tournamentusca@aol.com

Nov 17–21 / USCA Seniors & Masters Championship
West Palm Beach, FL / Erica Sherman - (561-478-0760) tournamentusca@aol.com

Nov 21–28 / WCF Womens Golf Croquet World Championship
Cairnlea, Victoria, Australia

Nov 30-Dec 02 / USCA National Golf Championship
West Palm Beach, FL / Erica Sherman - (561-478-0760) tournamentusca@aol.com

USCA Nine-Wicket Croquet Nationals Final Day Report

Nick Zink (left) and Matt Smith (right) received doubles champion trophies.
Tournament director Matt Griffith (center) presented.

Six partner teams battled it out starting at 8:00 a.m. on the final day of the USCA Nine-Wicket Nationals, but in the end Matt Smith and Nick Zink of Warrensburg, Missouri made a comeback win to take the doubles title over Matt Griffith and Billy Bob Breeden in a 27-23 thriller (more details to come on this match later).

In the first round, John Warlick and Paula Mol were able to advance with a win over George Cochran and Howard Menzel. In the other match, defending doubles champs Matt Baird and Art Parsells defeated Don Brooks and John Nichols.

In the semi-finals, Warlick and Mol battled Smith and Zink, but lost a close one 23-20. On the other field, Griffith and Breeden survived against Baird and Parsells 30-29. It featured an interesting final turn with Parsells needing to score 14-point wicket and 15PW for the tie. Hitting the stake would have secured a win. After splitting his partner yellow ball and clearing 14PW, Baird and Parsells discussed and opted for a takeoff to 15PW. Unfortunately the takeoff was a little long and created a short angle shot that Parsells attempted but missed. That secured the one-point victory for Griffith and Breeden.

In the third place game Baird and Parsells defeated Warlick and Mol.

USCA Nine-Wicket Croquet Nationals Day Two Report

Matt Smith lines up a shot in the finals (George Cochran is to the far left)

Day two mainly consisted of cutthroat action on one court and doubles play on the five other fields. However, the big event of the day was the singles finals which capped off the day. Matt Smith took down last year's champion George Cochran in an entertaining match. I wasn't able to take notes on the game (had my two daughters with me), but Smith essentially struggled at the end of each of his breaks to set up his partner ball, which left opportunities for Cochran. It led to Smith taking two 25-foot attempts at the stake with his red ball that failed. I expect to get more details on this match and post at a later time.

From the doubles action, two teams went undefeated and have first round byes this morning. Billy Bob Breeden and Matt Griffith went undefeated in one block and Matt Smith and Nick Zink matched that with an undefeated record in the other block. Today's first round games will start at 8:00 a.m. and the matchups are George Cochran/Howard Menzel against John Warlick/Paula Mol and Matt Baird/Art Parsells against Don Brooks/Johnny Nichols. That should put the doubles final around 11:00 a.m. this morning at Mid-America Sports Complex in Shawnee, Kansas.

USCA Nine-Wicket Croquet Nationals Day One Report

John Warlick during block play

It'll be a re-match for the 2009 Nine-Wicket Singles, as both George Cochran and Matt Smith survived block play and work their way through the eight-man elimination tournament. The singles final will take place at 4:00 p.m. tomorrow -- shortly after doubles block play concludes. Cochran won last year's and this should be an entertaining match.

Singles Elimination tourney results:

Round One
#1 George Cochran defeated #8 Dylan Goodwin 32-7
#4 Matt Baird defeated #5 Billy Bob Breeden 32-3
#3 Matt Smith defeated #6 Nick Zink 32-15
#2 Matt Griffith defeated #7 Don Brooks 32-14

Semi-Finals
#1 George Cochran defeated #4 Matt Baird 32-24
#3 Matt Smith defeated #2 Matt Griffith 32-24

Finals
#1 George Cochran vs #3 Matt Smith
(4:00 p.m. Saturday, 9/26, Mid-America Sports Complex, Shawnee, Kansas)

USCA Nine-Wicket Nationals Forecast

Tomorrow kicks off the USCA Nine-Wicket National Championship in Kansas City. The weather looks fantastic except for a slight chance of rain on Saturday (doubtful in my opinion). Since I'll be playing, it'll be a bit rough, but I'll look to provide daily updates if possible (they may be brief). I'll set up an open thread for tomorrow and please feel free to utilize the comments to discuss the tourney.

Unofficial projected numbers:

• 15 players for championship singles
• 8-9 doubles teams
• 8 players will battle it out for the cutthroat title. Defending champ Brad Clouse will defend his title

Let the games begin.

Croquet News Clips: Archie Burchfield, Sports Illustrated and Going for 100

Wow, working on the magazine has kept me away from the website more than I would like. A lot of news to catch up on:

The Archie Burchfield article on the Garden & Gun website tipped off by the USCA website last week was fantastic. Really seemed to maybe blur a bit between legend and reality, but that makes it even more interesting. It gave me a slightly different take on Jack Osborn:

"Archie got his number and called him up in New York City. 'Understand you boys play some croquet,' he said to Osborn and then invited him to bring his two best players to Kentucky for a match. Uncharmed, Osborn was neither slow nor particularly polite in telling Archie that he and his rube buddies could never hope to compete with the high strategy and skill levels of USCA players. Then he hung up."

I guess I was familiar with Osborn wanting cultivate that elite status, but I always took it as he thought that was the best way to grow the sport. If I buy into the portrayal in this article, it seems to be more of a firm belief. The description of the final between Archie and Mark Burchfield versus Osborn and Archie Peck is worth the read. A final note -- that's an interesting website name. I don't necessarily associate those two things with each other.

The Burchfield article sent me to the SI Vault to search for croquet stories. The SI Vault is a cool section of the Sports Illustrated website where you can check out full back issues of the magazine. I found two articles on croquet:

Here's the article SI did on the Burchfields vs Osborn/Peck final and here is the link to how it appeared in the magazine (go the end of the magazine and page back to 128).

And here's a 1995 article on Jacques Fournier as an eighth grader. The article is on page 12 and they even added a real live photo.

Being from Kansas, I want to discredit this portrayal of Kansas croquet with "no laying in." The stereotype that has handcuffed the sport. For the record, I've never played a game of croquet without a boundary.

Going for the century mark? Croquet two times a week might be the key:

The widow and mother-of-five drives herself to the shops, to church and to croquet two mornings a week.

Two things in this standard backyard croquet story standout to me. The first is they mention that croquet is much cheaper than golf and only requires a "twelve-pack of PBR" to play. I find that to be an odd coincidence in that I awarded a twelve-pack of PBR for my first backyard tourney. Not long after our little backyard club, became known as the PBR Tour. This quote also caught my attention:

“A lot of people think it's an old British man's sport, but many young people can play because it is really competitive.”

I was thinking that's a weird stereotype. However, I thought a little more and remembered that I had one grandfather that came straight over from Wales and my dad's side was British too. Another recent discovery is that I've landed in my early forties. So there you are -- I'm really an old British man and I play croquet. Stereotype = true.

Online Croquet Magazine Launch

Today, I'd like to announce the launch of Croquet Network Online Magazine. It is planned to be monthly and can be downloaded or viewed from this site with the username and password below. This first issue is just 11-pages, but we're just getting started and I've got some good stuff going for future issues. The first issue focuses on the USCA Nine-Wicket National Championship and features an interview with tournament director, Matt Griffith.

username: croquet
password: wicket1

Login at this link:

/croquet-magazine-online/

PLEASE NOTE: This issue is open to anyone, so feel free to forward it around. However, I am encouraging people to sign up to the e-newsletter on the main website (right nav bar) as the username/password for each future issue going forward will be delivered to subscribers via e-mail. This username and password will expire on October 15, 2009.

News Clips: Shane Botwin's Mallet Choice, NC Tactics and the Rothman Tour

Warning. The above video does feature a mallet to the head. For the most part though, I think it would be pretty tame by today's television standards. What's all the hubbub? You guessed it. Showtime's Weeds series finished it's most recent season by having young Shane Botwin kill off the latest criminal behind the criminal (Pilar) with a mallet. The timing was bizarre as I had been thinking about a plot for HBO's Entourage based around a celebrity pro-am golf croquet tourney (unfortunately, they just did a standard celebrity golf tourney -- trash talk while golfing is much like trash talking during an afternoon of coloring book fun with your four-year-old). Back to Weeds. The show had become pretty tiresome, but that certainly was a spicy cliffhanger. Give the props team an "F" though. It looks like your standard toy mallet and I believe the intent was to imply that the elitest residence would house some sort of real croquet equipment. It would have been more convincing if Shane would have swung a Fenwick Elliott. It's just on the edge though. One serious portrayal of real croquet on a major television show would do a lot of good.

I just discovered this tactical series on CroquetNC.org -- Moving Past the Improvement Plateau. Very useful and thus far there is a Part One and Part Two. Great illustrations.

Ben Rothman posted a Google map of croquet clubs he has visited over the past few years. If Rothman has attended your tournament or visited your club, I'd say that's a pretty good endorsement.