Where to find our players in the next month

29th of June - Hunstanton B-Level (GC)

Andrew Fall, Henry Hobbs, Des Taylor

30th of June - Hunstanton C-Level (GC)

Fiona Fall

10th of July - Nottingham B-Level (GC)
Andrew Fall

11th of July - Bath B-Level (GC)
Des Taylor

25/08/19

Andrew Fall wins Hurlingham B-Level

In the final B-Level competition of the season, Andrew overcame Raghu Iyer in the final to make it three Enfield players in the B-Level final, to be played at Guildford on the 7th and 8th of September.

Raghu Iyer and Edwin Bone swept all before them in the initial block stage on Saturday, but there was tight competition for the other semifinal slots. Dave Hill and Thomas Halliday, the other two Enfield players in the field of sixteen, could only manage two wins apiece.

Andrew's four wins left a tight finish, relying on B-Level debutant Keith Toovey losing to Tony Nicholas by more than one hoop. In the end, Tony won 7-5, sending Andrew through to the semifinals on net hoops.

In Sunday's consolation event, the biggest talking point was in Dave's match against Andrea Huxley. After reaching the golden hoop, Dave ran it backwards to leave his ball an inch in front of the hoop. Andrea followed this shot up with an identical shot, her ball not quite clearing the hoop but leaving the two balls too close to avoid a double-tap if hit. A cat-and-mouse battle ensued with the remaining two balls, trying to engineer a jump shot while the balls at the hoop were repeatedly deemed. Dave's eventual jump shot attempt failed but separated the deemed balls, and Andrea eventually won a very tight match.

Andrew lost his first game against Edwin in a best-of-three semifinal, but came back through two exceptionally long games to win the match in what was exhausting heat. After lunch, Raghu, at that point still unbeaten, beat Andrew again in the first game of the final.

Eventually, Andrew prevailed 6-7 7-4 7-4 to win his first B-Level and qualify for the final alongside Des Taylor and Henry Hobbs.

Report by Thomas Halliday

ROEHAMPTON B-LEVEL

23rd of May 2019

Andrew Fall was third at Roehampton's B-Level tournament, winning his morning block and quarterfinal, but coming unstuck against eventual runner-up Brian McCausland (Nailsea, 3) in the semifinal, losing 6-7.

Andrew went on to win the 3rd/4th place playoff by 10-9 against the other losing semifinalist, Anthony Nicholas (Cheam, 4), gaining 4 more points towards B-level series final qualification.

WATFORD B-LEVEL & SUSSEX COUNTY C-LEVEL

5th & 6th of May 2019

Enfield players dominated the Watford GC B-Level tournament on Monday.

Both blocks were won by Enfield players - one by Andrew Fall, who was the only player in the event to win five games out of five at the block stage; and the other by Des Taylor, who triumphed on hoop difference over two other players also winning three games.

In the final Des beat Andrew 7-3, while Dave Hill and Henry Hobbs, who each came third in their blocks, fought out the 5/6 place playoff, won by Dave, to give Enfield four of the top six places in the event.

Earlier in the weekend, at the Sussex County GC C-Level tournament on Sunday, Thomas Halliday won five out of six matches, losing only to the eventual winner in the block stage and finishing third overall.

As a tournament winner, Des automatically qualifies for the B-Level National Final to be held in September, while Andrew and Thomas, as top four finishers, earn points towards qualification for the B- and C-Level finals respectively.

SURBITON AC EASTER HANDICAP

19th of April - 20th of April

Thomas Halliday made the journey down to Surbiton to play in the Easter Handicap as part of a field of 30 players. The format was a flexible Swiss tournament with players playing as many matches as they had time for across the two days.

In the first match, Thomas, playing off 16, took his first ball to peg for the cost of two bisques and, despite a less good second break, beat scratch player Chris Roberts +26 with four bisques standing. That prompted CA handicappers to convene, and the unusual occurrence of a mid-tournament handicap cut to 12. Across the next two days, Thomas beat Alison Maugham (+26, h'cap -0.5), Jeff Dawson (+17, h'cap -2), Ian Plummer (+26, h'cap 0.5) and James Hopgood (+24, h'cap -2), but lost to Phil Dunk (-2, h'cap 2.5) and the eventual tournament winner Peter Spiller (-9 on time, h'cap 9), who was unbeaten in all his 6 matches. Thomas finished with 5 wins from 7, which put him in joint fourth place.

Report by Thomas Halliday