Croquet Durham beat Nottingham in the first match of the 2019 Murphy Shield Campaign

Our team of Roger Carpenter, George Cansino, Dave Parsons and Nigel Martin travelled to York on 26 April to play Nottingham in the Preliminary Round of the 2019 Murphy Shield competition.

After a very close match where the preponderance of games went to hoop 12 or 13, we prevailed 5-2.

Weatherwise, the morning was bright with sunny intervals, but while we were leading 1-0 at lunch time thanks to Dave, the doubles and the other singles were both tied one game each.

As forecast, the weather worsened slightly in the afternoon with a few light showers, but things progressed steadily in the croquet and we finally prevailed. Detailed scores were (handicaps in brackets):

Roger (2) & Nigel (3) beat Cathy Turski (4) & Bob Thompson (4): 7-6, 5-7, 7-3
Dave (4) beat Andy Dixon (9): 7-4, 7-5
George (8) lost to Particia Duke Cox (5): 7-3, 6-7, 6-7
Roger beat Cathy: 6-7, 7-5, 7-5
Nigel beat Bob: 7-6, 6-7, 7-4
Dave lost to Patricia: 7-5, 6-7, 6-7
George beat Andy: 7-6, 7-6

Many thanks to everyone who took part and to York for providing excellent facilities for the day.