Mark van Loon won the Ealing Advanced Weekend

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Robin Brown enjoying his lunch

Blue skies, warm sunshine and fast lawns. Hardly what we expect from the first tournament of the season! But such was the case at Ealing on the first weekend in April.

Only 9 players competed this year. A development squad weekend at Cheltenham, a Colour Order AC event at Surbiton, a holiday in Mauritius and a 60th birthday party in Berkshire had all conspired to lure away some of the regulars. Among the field, it was good to see a couple of new faces at this tournament; Jonathan Smith and Gediminas Smolskas.

Hopefully, both will return next year.

Last year's winner, Debbie Lines, soon showed she meant business. Late start, Robin Brown, had barely arrived when Debbie completed her 7th turn TP against Nigel Polhill. Only 2 other TPs were scored during the weekend, by Andy Myers and Ian Lines. Possibly due to Winter cobwebs but, no doubt, the well set hoops also played their part. Day 1 ended with Debbie, Andy and Nigel all on 2 wins out of 3. Only Mark van Loon was unbeaten on 3 out of 3. By the time the afternoon games commenced on day 2, it was still possible for any of 4 players to win the event.

Nigel needed to beat Mark to create a 3 way tie between Mark, Nigel and the winner of Debbie vs Andy. But Mark saw to it that this didn't happen, maintaining his unbeaten run to lift the trophy.

Without a doubt, the stars of the weekend were Ealing's new catering team. Saturday's lunch was a hearty chicken dish followed by cheesecake and fruit salad. Sunday's salmon was cooked to perfection and followed by pavlova. One player even declared it the best meal he'd ever had at a croquet tournament. And all accompanied by complementary wine courtesy of the manager (and Middlesex team sommelier).

Full results available on Croquetscores.