Croquet South East GC Level Play League 2026

Sussex County started their campaign in the Croquet South East GC Level Play League 2026 with a hard fought home match against Hove Beach CC.

The team of David Dickins, Douglas Shand, Brian Aikens and Simon Ancell found themselves 1-2 down at lunchtime after some excellent play by the members of the Hove Beach team. This meant that, of the four Singles matches to be played in the afternoon, Sussex County needed to win three of them to clinch victory.

Whatever was in the home team’s lunch seemed to do the trick, as Sussex County managed to secure the three required wins to turn the tables and run out winners of this very close match, 4-3.

Brian Aikens

Perry wins award

Perry from the club's pear tree has won another award at the 2025 Bluebell festival. One of our ciders also won the Cider of the festival award.

We now have other perries that we produce, so we have had to rename our flagship club perry, calling it Hoop & Mallet. It will be available at the Lewes festival next week along with another perry and three ciders of ours.

We are curious to find out more about the Pear tree. If anyone knows anything about the origin, please let us know. The RHS will perform DNA testing of samples free of charge for members and will want as much background information as possible. Do we have any RHS members in the club? Packages should be sent early in the week to avoid spoiling.

If any members know of a perry pears (non-culinary pears) source, please let us know.

David & Deborah Marcus

GC doubles 30th May

A fine day greeted the 36 players who had entered this tournament, it was thankfully cooler than it had been earlier in the week.

Division A was a straight forward win for Richard Brooks and David Dickens who won all of their games They were followed by Brian and Konstantine who had three wins beating Simon Ancell and Vincent only by the fact that they had won their match with Simon and Vincent both teams having three wins and + 4 hoops.

Division two was closer with Mark Barnham and Tony Marjoram and Sue and Tony Nicholas both having 4 wins Mark and Tony however had a better hoop count +14 against +8.  Beryl Hughes and Gavin Taylor were third.

Division C was won by members of Bromley CC John Butler and Gloria Perez-Vertiz with 4 wins beating David Funnell and Diana Rolfe, both having four wins but John and Gloria had a +12 hoop count against  David and Diana.

Division D was won by Jane Sims and Peter Hill.

Full results to come but all the scores are on Croquet Scores

Thanks to Roger for managing the event

One Day GC Tournament 15th May 2026

Thankfully the rain which had threatened all day held off. 24 players where divided into 4 divisions of six so each player had five games.

Division 1 gave an indication as to the improvement of the standard of play within the club; all players were club members with two players with minus handicaps. Gabrielle and Konstantine however finished in third and forth places. Rob Harper who recently has been cut to 1 winning with 4 wins and Simon Ancell was runner-up.

Division B also had a close finish with Tony Jolly 4 wins plus 10 hoops just beating Andrew Stewart also with 4 wins but only 8 hoops. Sam Holder was third.

Tim Bick was a run away winner in Division C with 5 wins followered by Sue Nicholas and Peter Hill.

Division D was won by Jane Powell with 4 wins followed by Mark Barnham and David Larkin.

Thanks to Roger for managing the event

Full results to follow, but already on CroquetScores