The Sidmouth June tournament was played last week with players competing from as far afield as Sweden and Colchester, writes David Butler.

Wednesday saw the start of the tournament with the playing of the handicap singles. Players were arranged in four American blocks and, at the end of the day the block winners were; Brian Shorney (Eardisley/Budleigh Salterton) , Philip Harris (Sidmouth), Georgeen Hemming (Colchester) and Mike Taylor (Sidmouth).

The semi-finals saw Georgeen Hemming beat Brian Shorney (+8) and Mike Taylor beat Philip Harris (+8). In the final Georgeen beat Mike (+9).

Friday saw the start of the class event, which was advanced play for all blocks.

Block A for the Challenge Cup saw a tie for first place with three players each recording four wins from six matches.

The three were, last year’s winner, Cliff Jones, Colin Hemming and Swedish player Simon Carlsson.

The latter had played in the Golf Croquet (GC) European Championships in Budleigh Salterton the previous week and is over in the UK for another few weeks combining sightseeing with a few other croquet tournaments!

Luckily for the tournament manager it was easy to determine the winner as Simon had beaten both Cliff and Colin. Cliff was runner-up having beaten Colin.

Block B for the David Rawkins Cup was won, very convincingly, by Richard Williamson (Bristol) with six wins from his six matches. All the runners-up (with three wins from their six matches), were from Sidmouth, notably, David Clarke, Peter Nelson and Roger Hendy.

Block C for the Fortfield Cup was won by Philip Harris with five wins from his six matches. The results for this block were very close with three other players having four wins from six; Kathy Wallace (Nailsea ), Brian Shorney and Sidmouth player Brian Pollock.

Georgeen Hemming won a bottle of wine for the fastest game during the tournament and Vera Henderson - a long standing member of the club - presented the cups at the conclusion of another exceptional event.