A report by Patricia Mulcahy who was Ireland’s sole representative at the World GC Championships held in North Carolina in October.

The CAI Selection Committee are pleased to announce that the following team has been selected to play in the GC World Team Championships taking place in Tasmania in February 2025.

Mark Stephens (Captain)
Alan Looney
Kieran Murphy
Evan Newell
Rob O’Donoghue
Simon Williams

Three events were held: the Singles Championship, the Maggie Handicap Doubles, and the Plate event.

Singles Event: 24 players were sorted into six blocks, with winners and runners-up advancing to the quarter-finals. Notable matches included Huw Spiers' victory against Mark Stephens and Simon Williams' triumph in the final over Glenn Fauske to claim the Irish Singles title.
Maggie Handicap Doubles: Cami and Tate Russock, a visiting couple from Florida, won the Doubles event, making them the first foreign names on the trophy. They defeated the Irish duo of Huw Spiers and Marguerite Cremin Chung in the final.
Plate Event: Celine Reilly won the Plate final, beating Henry Bagwell on hoop 13.

As we approach the final. the last Seed remaining (Mohamed Nasr) has fallen and the Finalists this evening are (only) two Block 3rd seeds Fawzy Helmy and Ayman Nagah. But these bare statistics do not reveal the high standards of this Competition as match after match was played with so many different aspects in play and just sheer intensity. In a way we have the two most deserving contestants in the Final as Mohammed Nasr (who lost to Fawzy Helmy in the semis last night on hoop 13 final game but more of that later) had actually dropped his only other game (a block 19 pointer) to Ayman.

Shock reverberates around the Croquet World .. Three ex-World Champs (+ Mohamed Taha = top 4 seeds) defeated in first Round of Knockout .. All games of a high standard but Reg's game is outstanding and I am going to say that is about equal to the best I have seen him play. The game never quite ran in his favour and on three or four critical moments he was forced into difficult options because of long-distance blocks (perfect pace) by his young (unknown) opponent: Particularly last game at hoop 11 where he was forced to have a go at jumping a ball in the jaws from angled North Boundary ..

Early Rounds Report by Evan Newell

So what is going on in the real world of Golf Croquet here at the Egyptian Open?

It is not as it seems. Ben Rothman failed to get through his Block (first 3 in each Block) but gets a second chance (clever 4th, 5th, 6th knock out of 24 players to produce 8 additional qualifiers). Reg scraped through with only one loss BUT three of his games were desperate affairs all going to 9 all and a last hoop win.

Entries for the Irish Golf Croquet Championships should be sent it as soon as possible.

See link in left side bar for entry form.

Note the singles is a championship event played off scratch whilst the doubles is a handicap event. Places may be limited so get your entries in early

The annual match between CAI and CqE (as the Croquet Association is now referred to) was played on 20/21 July at Carrickmines, with the visitors emerging on the right side of the 14 - 10 scoreline, retaining the trophy they won at Southport last year.

Starting on a wet and miserable Saturday with a round of doubles, the Irish were 3 - 0 down by lunchtime and never recovered. The two rounds of singles showed the sides evenly matched and so the day ended at 9 - 6.

Ireland made it three in a row at Balgreen on 29-30th June in the third of the GC matches between the two sides. The SCA had put a lot of hard work into team development and had four new players in its line up, but they were no match for the more experienced Irish side and the final score was 53- 24 in favour of the visitors. All the Irish team contributed to the win and gained valuable match experience ahead of the European GC Women’s Championship in August in which five of them are taking part.

The 2024 Golf Croquet European Championships started today, Thursday16th May, at Sussex County Croquet Club in Southwick, near Brighton, England. There are those who will question whether England is now in Europe but a similar refrain would issue, as to those who question emerging ideologies of the self: "You're anything you want to be, baby."
The England we know and love is home to magnificent 'ballers - like Bukayo Saka and Phil Foden, not to mention outstanding communities of croquet practitioners throughout its counties and shires.