English National Golf Croquet Championship Heats at Nailsea

[<<] [>>] by Peter Dyke at Nailsea
13 Jun 2004 (GC)

1. Peter Dyke (2 wins) beat Kevin Ham 7-6 & Marcus Evans 7-4
2. Marcus Evans (2 wins) beat Ian Megaw 7-6 & Kevin Ham 7-5
3. Kevin Ham (1 win) beat Ian Megaw 7-5
4. Ian Megaw (1 win) beat Peter Dyke 7-5

Peter Dyke recovered well from being 3-nil down against Kevin Ham to level the scores at 3-all. He was also 6-5 down in the same game and managed to take the last two hoops to win 7-6. He was unable to repeat this against Ian Megaw. Ian took the third hoop to lead 2-1, Peter sent both his balls down to good slightly angled hoop-running positions for hoop 4. Ian shot at these balls, narrowly missed, and ran the hoop instead!!! Peter never really recovered and Ian took the next hoop as well to lead 4-1. Although Peter rallied to be 6-5 down untypically he missed a clearance shot at hoop 12 and Ian took the hoop to win 7-5. In the final round Peter could not do a thing wrong, running long angled hoops against Marcus Evans to win 7-4. He then had to wait for the result of the other game between Kevin and Ian to see if he had qualified for the finals. Interestingly had Ian won the game 7-6, there would have been a 3-way tie on two wins between Peter, Marcus and Ian and Peter and Ian would have been equal on net points (both ahead of Marcus), so Ian would have won on "who beat whom" instead of coming fourth. However Kevin won the game and Peter qualified beating Marcus on "who beat whom". (So the second best player won!!)