Official portrait of Our Patron

Following help from the Maître d’ at the Palace we were able to find a copy of the official portrait of the King and the Salvation Army came up with a frame. This will hang in the clubhouse next season.

Liz won the Carolean Cup this Year.

Posted by Webmeister, 15th October.

Peter & Liz in Corfu 2025

Playing own ball, Peter & CCC Chairman, Rich Quilter were runners up in the handicap doubles. Liz lost in the final to Alan Clark.
These most beautiful Olive wood trophies are cool and smooth to the touch.

🎭 Corfu Final: A Duel in the Sun:

In the opening ninety minutes, Liz carved out a commanding nine-hoop lead; simply an exhibition of calm dominance and clinical control. The crowd murmured approval, sensing a coronation in motion.

But then Alan struck.

With a steely gaze and a mallet that whispered precision, he hit in and unleashed a break of breathtaking finesse. Nine hoops fell in succession, each one a masterclass in timing and touch. The spectators, once relaxed, now leaned forward—spellbound by the comeback of a man possessed.

The final half hour was pure theatre. Hoop by hoop, the players traded blows like seasoned gladiators. Alan edged ahead, two hoops clear, and then made his move toward three-back. The shot—a bold attempt to seal the match—missed. Liz’s red ball lingered nearby, a silent witness to opportunity. She stepped up. Hit in avoiding a costly rush peel by a whisker. The crowd held its breath as she made her next hoop. One more hoop to draw level. The lawn, baked hard under the Corfu sun, offered no mercy. Her slow roll roquet—delicate, deliberate—veered off course, hilling ever so slightly.

Missed.

Gasps. Groans. Applause. It was, without question, the most electrifying finish to any final in Corfu’s storied croquet history.

Posted by Webmeister, 10th October.

Annual Dinner 2025

Once again at the Palace Rooms, with wonderful service and delicious food, we did the usual seat swapper. Jan and Claire ran the raffle which was super-sucessful. The prize giving was an extended one because, apart from the internals, we won so many other things! Barbara Bentwood was presented with her 'Blue'. While most entries racked up a minus score, Helen won the Fantasy Menu Guess prize with a remarkable +26TP.

To finish the evening Ian and Betty took their places on the stage as half of 'The Frogs Of Darkness' (Contact Paul 07739 718607). They put on a great show of diverse songs and captivated us by their great sound.

Posted by Webmeister, 20th September.

Finaly Finalising the Finals

BRADSHAW TROPHY

In the big hitting in department, Andrew is right up there and despite Liz doing some herself, he went on to a deserving victory in the 18 point game.

Posted by Webmeister, 17th September.

Finalising the Finals

TOWER TROPHY

In a break in the weather on an otherwise very inclement weekend, we have just played the Tower Trophy final. Result: John & Joanne beat Liz & Stewart 2-0 (7-6, 7-2). Plenty of good play on show, and our fair share of oopsies of course. Finished just before a downpour! ...and we've bought some rather nice-looking chutney too.

Posted by John, 13th September.

Finals

PROGRESS CUP

Our level play golf competition, took place this afternoon between Stewart and Derek. Excellent hooping from Stewart, but Derek's overall play saw him win 2 - 0, both games going to 7 - 6. Well done.

CAROLEAN CUP

Derek took part in his second of the three finals he has qualified for this year. This time taking on Liz in the 14 point full lawn A/C competition. He took his first ball round with half his bisques. Liz then took a ball round and pegged Derek's ball off. Liz eventually won 14 -11

Posted by Alison, 10th September.

Taster Session Sucess

Betty and Stuart hosted a fabulous fun family today at the club. The three generations thoroughly enjoyed their time at the lawns and were so inspired they are going to look up their local club. All players were very proficient and they even surprised themselves (including Grandma Pamela) at how easy and well they had taken to their new found sport.

Posted by Betty & Stuart, 19th August.

Trafalgar Plate Final

Thanks to all who took part in the competition throughout the summer and for completing the matches in good time. 

The final took place this morning betwen Sue and Ursula, in glorious sunny warm conditions. A group of members came to support and enjoyed watching some excellent play by both. In a close fought match Ursula came out the winner. 7 - 5, 5 - 7, 7 - 4.

Posted by Barbara, 16th August.

Red Arrows Tournament: Where Bisques Fly and Rovers Cry

Nathan winning the FAST, to the delight of the gallery

Managed with flair by Peter & Liz (who deserve sainthood for keeping the chaos charming), this year’s tournament was a delightful cocktail of strategy, suspense, and occasional muttering at mallets.

With a generous 90-minute game time, players had ample opportunity to showcase their skills—or dramatically overthink hoop 6. Nearly half the matches ended in nail-biting three-ball finales, like a Shakespearean drama but with more lawn and fewer soliloquies.

Block Play Highlights

Two blocks of four, single banked. Translation: lots of waiting, lots of watching, and plenty of whispered “oofs” from the sidelines.

  • Lee, playing off three peels, was the crowd’s favorite spectacle. He swept his block, leaving Alison, Benedict, and Ian blinking in disbelief and possibly Googling “how to beat Lee.”
  • Nathan, with a handicap of 1.5 and the precision of a Swiss watch, gave Betty and Barry no room to breathe. Rob, ever the daredevil, was always looking to pull off a third-turn round—but Rover had other plans.

⚔️ The Final Showdown

The final began with all the tension of a Victorian staring contest. Nathan made the first move, getting to peg with red like a croquet ninja. Lee responded with a long shot that missed by just enough to make spectators gasp and clutch their tea.

Nathan then wrapped things up with a second all-round break so smooth it could’ve been served with clotted cream. Victory was his—and somewhere, a Rover wept.

Until next year, may your hoops be kind and your bisques plentiful!

Posted by CoPilot AI, Humour Department, 9th August.

The midgeland

Alison is the winner!

This one day handicap golf competition was scheduled for a day which promised an amber weather warning for flooding and thunderstorms. Fortunately none of this happened and the 5 round swiss was played and finished before 3pm. Expeditious play and t-shirts with matching pegs was the order of the day. After 4 rounds Claire Pearson was on 4 wins with Alison Broughton and Carole Waters on 3. Alison played and beat Claire and Carole played and lost to Shelagh Fagen resulting in Alison being the overall winner without manager Liz Wilson having to resort to the small print. Well done to all 13 competitors on a fun and well played day.

mode et élégance combinées

Posted by Liz, 19th July.

FCC @ PCCC

Under blue sky, Lee won the Rose Bowl

Under blue sky, Under blue sky, Betty & Liz won the Doubles Salvers

A very Sunny four days at Pendle & Craven with nothing but blue skys most of the time. Liz was thanked for her contribution of managing the tournament for the last umteen years and enjoyed the lay-ins and early finishes. Liz, Peter, Betty and Lee entered everything. Winning the advanced, Lee made the game look simple with his fast accurate play. Betty was on long range target in all the doubles with Liz making great breaks as well. Lee and Peter went out of the doubles first round.

11th July.

Festival of Croquet runner up

We have added to the trophy cabinet again with Team Walker bagging the Handicap Golf and Team Wilson the Advanced. Take a look in our 2025 entries in the Trophy Cabinet and look back over the years!

Advanced Trophy

Handicap Golf Trophy

We competed across all the disciplines. LPG; Claire, Stewart and Ursula. HG(1st); Ted & Barbara W. A(1st); Peter & Liz. S; Alison, Rob and Barbara B. H (3rd); Phil, Barry, Philip B and Andrew.

We won the Manager's Prize for the team running the most hoops.

Robin Tasker Festival Manager writes:

After a weekend of wonderful sunshine, 134 games of croquet and with 2229 hoops run, Crake emerged as the clear and deserved 2025 Champions. Throughout the weekend both Fylde and Llanfairfechan had challenged for the lead but ended in second and third places respectively. The Handicap GC was won by Fylde with a five-way tie for second place whereas in the Level Play GC Llanfairfechan ran out decisive winners being undefeated over the weekend. At Association Croquet, Crake were clear winners in the Short Lawn event while Bowdon just held off Crake on hoop count to win the 18-point Handicap event. And finally after a day of triple-banked 14-point Advanced singles, Fylde ran out victorious in the Advanced competition. A Festival Manager’s prize awarded to the team running the most hoops over the course of the Festival was won by Fylde with 395 hoops run.

Finally thanks must be given to Southport for once more hosting the Festival and doing so with superb aplomb.

Photos by Tony Thomas. FxS by FCC.

29th June.

Palatine Corporate

Fylde croquet club welcomed Palatine Rotary club again for their annual fundraiser. Palatine Rotary is part of the larger Rotary network who raise money for charitable causes.

Despite a previous whoop hoop of 43 feet, Ges wins the award for the longest hoop ... 60 feet!

And thanks to the Fylde volunteers, Sheila, Lindsay, John, Stewart, Claire and Betty who made the evening run so smoothly. Even the spectators had fun.

Howard beats Peter (last years winner) in the Final.

17th June.

Congratulations from everyone at the club

Lee Triggers to Minus One And A Half.

30th May.

Low Short handicaps adjusted

With the popularity of Short Croquet increasing, CqE have made some adjustments to the mandatory peels required by the Short Croquet Automatic Handicap System.

Not only does this change have an effect on players being given an initial handicap based on their Full Lawn Handicap. but it also requires players with an existing Short Handicap Card to possibly make a one off adjustment to their index.

Please visit the CqE page link HERE if your a/c handicap is scratch or below.

24th May.

Lorna Ndawarda returns from the South of France

Lorna has been chatting with CoPilot. Learning that : 'Blackpool has been experiencing an unusually dry spell, with no recorded rainfall! However, a 320-mile rain system is expected to hit on May 22nd bringing cooler temperatures and unsettled conditions after weeks of sunshine. It looks like the dry streak might finally come to an end soon'.

No sign of it as at 15:00, but she will meet up with Barry tomorrow to work on the disturbed ground around the peg that held the net posts. Soil, sand and seeds will hopefully be naturally watered very soon.

22nd May.

Fylde Abroad

Ursula wins Golf at Chester and at the Pendle Advanced a/c weekend Phill Snowden Lifted the C class trophy. In the B class Liz was second and Peter third.

18th May.

Nearly 20 years ago

We moved to our lawns at the end of December 05 from Hope Street. Here is a panorama of what we took on. I hope you can see it on a wide screen sometime.

*Click here for the earliest picture of our lawns*

The archive news reports we were delighted at the prospect. You may see we had started work by digging up an old tennis court fence. On the East of old lawn 3 the marks of fallen trees can be seen.

11th May.

New Flagpole and Lawn X

Barry and Ian have replaced the mast in pole position voted for by the membership and very nice it is too. Then Peter was invited to join the ends of the rope together. After much deliberation a Flemish Bend was the knot of choice. Now then... with a little delay on the building we have sketched out a third full lawn which is in front of the pavilion. We had to avoid the damaged test drill areas but we were able to make it almost full size. This will be marked, cut and hoops set soon. When booking Short 5 or Full Lawn X please note which you want in the text field.

9th May.

Lawns Opened

Following the boundary marking and white lining and Lawn repairs by Barry and Ian, Barbara and Rob, Andrew, Liz and Peter set out the two full and five short lawns today.

Then they opened the lawns with a couple of short games on the new (possibly only temporary) short lawn.

5th April.

AGM

The AGM took place on 26th March, the minutes are available in the members section now.

2nd April.

Twinned Croquet Club

We are pleased to report that Waiheke CC, New Zealand and Fylde CC have become twinned clubs in friendship.

Fylde presented Waiheke with a Commodore 64 to assist their club diary being online. In reply Waiheke gave us a Red Kite to help us with our annual rabbit problem.

This beautiful bird of prey, with a Fylde Blue collar, is currently housed in the pavillion. Please take care when entering and remember to keep the door closed at all times.

Fortunately, our new member, Jason Delaydes has some experience with all sorts of birds and will be taking ours out occasionally at twilight.

Ideas for names are sought. Email the Webmeister with your suggestion!

1st April.

keep calm and fix it

The team continue to prepare the club in the new configuration. Overhanging branches removed, progress on the Gimmee repair, diagonal scarifying, more cutting, the hoops painted. Not to mention decluttering the garage. Interested parties will find the web calendars for lawn booking and matches are all fired up.

21st March.

Work group

Thanks to Barbara, Barbara, Ursula, Rob, Andrew, Lee, Philip, Liz and Peter who turned up to start on preparation for the new season.  Despite uncertainty over exactly what will happen and when with regard to the proposed Indoor Padel Tennis many jobs were identified and progressed.  Ally Pally was painted, The new lawn was mowed and the dips where the tennis net posts had been removed were repaired.  Storm damage to the Gimmie Shelter was assessed and repairs started.  The weather is looking to be set fair this week so more work will be planned.

16th March.

preparing the New Lawn

Preliminary work completed. Now allow to rest and settle. Later with top soil.

1st December.

annual Dinner

We were all delighted to be back again at the St Annes Palace where they looked after us with style. Warm and welcoming staff and great food made it a special evening. We all had time to applaude our members who have achieved a win here, a win there. Many thanks to Jan with helpers Alison, Betty. Liz and Barry who also ran the internal tournaments. They all took time out to make sure all was in order prior to the event and decorating the room. Yet more thanks to Jan for the raffle that boosted the coffers. The following is a remarkable list of achievements by our members. Additionally see the Honous Boards for our internal tournament winners.

CA Events CA Diploma – Catherine Bass

External Competitions:
International Events
Greek Open A/C Singles Runner-up – Peter Wilson

CA Events -
Pendle Mid-week - Irish Cup – Betty Bates
Fastest Game – Liz Wilson
Doubles – Lee Hartley
Hunstanton C Class – Betty Bates - Handicap – Lee Hartley

North West Federation Events
Pennine Cup Team of 6 vs Croquet North won 7-2 Lee & Betty Millennium Advanced A/C – Lee Hartley
Millennium Handicap A/C – Phil Snowden
Festival of Croquet: – And first Club overall (at last!) Fylde

Fylde Blue – playing for Fylde for the first time - Helen Frogatt

22nd November.

The 2024 News Is Archived Here

1st January 2025