Over five weeks in January and February, 25 valiant croquet players braved the cold weather to play in the Valentine’s tournament. There were a great many games played in both the Association Croquet and Golf Croquet tournaments.

The semi finals and finals were played on February the 12th. The semi finalists for GC were Fiachra Carroll, John McAuley, Yvonne Marrinan and Alan Looney. The finalists for AC were Sandy Greig and Anne-Marie McGowan.

In a very close fought semi final, Yvonne and Fiachra battled right to the golden hoop. It came down to a final jump shot by Yvonne which unfortunately put Fiachra’s ball through instead finishing 7-3 to Fiachra. John and Alan also had a tight game with John pushing Alan but Alan came out victorious winning 7-2.
Meanwhile in the AC final Anne-Marie brought her first ball around but used 4 of her 6 bisques to do it. She left a long shot for Sandy to hit which he narrowly missed allowing Anne-Marie to start to go round with her second ball.

The GC final between Alan and Fiachra started with some back and forth before a very troubling hoop 4 threw Alan’s game. He kindly put Fiachra’s ball through two hoops in the game with the final score being 7-2 to Fiachra.

Despite some excellent shots, Anne-Marie broke down and let Sandy into the game allowing him to bring both his balls around and finish in stylish fashion!A shared lunch was enjoyed by all afterwards and is a planned fixture for Sundays for the rest of the year