Author: huddersfieldpetanque

Time is running out for people who want to attend our Annual dinner on Friday 12th January 2018. The limit is 40 people and we have 32 booked so there are only 8 places left. All it takes is a £10 deposit plus you to choose your meal from a list of choices and you’re booked. There are menus in the clubhouse  and in addition to the meal there are many games and awards to play and hand out.

Total cost is £25 which includes a two for staff. We’ve had a few of these and they’re good fun. We will be presenting 5 petanque oscars on the night and there will be plenty of prizes for the games and the raffle. Ask a committee member if you want to now more.

December Members Melee is on Sunday so there will be plenty of people to tell you what the dinner is like.

8 pairs played out a cool pairs competition on Sunday 12th November. Cool because it was only about 5 degrees but also because we had some visitors from Rainworth (near Mansfield) where they have a Petanque club and where we will probably have a trip next summer to play an inter club fixture. Pictured are Patrick and Diana from Rainworth who walked away with the second prize on the day. Read more below.The games were drawn and everyone started to keep themselves warm. We were worried that we might not finish in the light but in the end everyone played their 3 rounds. Two teams didn’t win at all; one team won a single game; four teams won 2 games but one team won all 3 and were therefore the winners. Well done Maureen and Nigel. Pictures may follow. With an entry fee and cash prizes that meant they had £16 to divvy up.

Pat and Diana were second with 2 wins and the best points difference thanks mainly to a 3 end 13-0 win in round two and took home £12. The Rebels were 3rd (£6) and the Beeches 4th.

But as Pat and Diana were driving home they realised that the points difference read out at the end wasn’t right and they began to worry if they hadn’t in fact won second place. The evidence (the scoresheet) was in the shed but could not be accessed until Monday evening when an enquiry was launched under Chief of Detectives Roy Henstock with the result that the First and Second places were declared fine and dandy and thoroughly deserved but the points difference had been added up incorrectly. The enquiry continues into minor places.  Moral of the story: Check your points differences.

Wednesday saw a long awaited event at Heckmondwike. 18 players from each club played in a triples competition based on the Mansfield formula where 4 rounds were played but the first 3 were a standard snake but the 4th round was seeded on the results of the previous 3 games. This meant that in the last round the top home team played the top away team so everyone played a team their own level at the end.

Here’s the team photo. Numerate readers will count 16 players. Two were missing at this stage – one arrived but another was unwell so one of our triples was a double.The most eagerly anticipated item on the day was the free lunch and with an 11 o’clock start this was expected after the first game at about noon. But as experienced players know only too well some games were over quite soon and some took a long time. Some teams started their second game. Lunch started about 1230 and went on for a while. Some teams had played one; some had played two. Lunch was great although the wine that was rumoured turned out to be Cotes de Nowhere.

First round was 3-3; second round was 4-2 to Huddersfield; 3rd round was 3-3. That meant Heckmondwike had to win 4-2 to draw. It went down to the last wicket partnership between Ralph, Kath and Roger Farrar and a close game which ended with the win they needed. So it was 12-12 draw but to determine the winner we looked at points scored and it was Heckmondwike 233 to Huddersfield 215. The Ashes returned to Heckmondwike.

Here’s the complicated scoresheet.

In the crowded clubhouse there was a thank you speech by Gordon (Heckmondwike Chair) who thanked the caterers and then Clive (Heckmondwike Secretary) told us the story of the Ashes and presented the trophy to himself and stated provocatively that the trophy would never leave Heckmondwike. Paul (Huddersfield Chair) proposed rematch in summer 2018 and everyone agreed to that. Here’s the little Urn.

Clive was obviously worried that the trophy would be snatched by Huddersfield so had hired a mafia hitman as bodyguard for the day.The history of the Kirklees Ashes is on the wall in Heckmondwike clubhouse if anyone wants to read the full story. From memory the home team wins and there have been 3 such fixtures in 3 years.

Huddersfield’s best team was Brendan, Roy & Sue who won all their first 3 games.

Sunday 22nd October saw this event take place. 10 teams of 6 players each turned up at the Fox in Stockton to play at 9am and being as it was our first such event we weren’t sure what the format would be. Roy, Sue, Brendan, Paul, Kevin and Christine were our team. Photos of our team may surface on the dark web shortly.

The format was 3 pairs followed by 2 triples. Wins were assigned different points. A win where opposition scored 6 or more was 2 points, a good win (opposition scored under 6) was 4 points and a thrashing (opposition on zero) was 6 points.

Here’s the complicated master score sheet where you can see some of the team names and some results and points scored. And here’s Huddersfield’s results.  Round 1 was difficult getting used to the terrain and the level of play which was quite high. We scored nowt. Round 2 there was a single win but in Round 3 there were 3 wins. No big wins so we ended the pairs on 8 points and were tying for last place with 3 other teams. The triples went badly although 2 games that looked like wins suddenly turned into losses (8-3 up and lost to a 4 and a 6 in consecutive ends and 11-9 up and losing 11-13) and we stayed on 8 points to end up as the strongest team in the competition. (Holding the rest up). Overall result yet to be announced but we’ll bring it to you when we see it. We left before the end.

Overall it was great day out. 60 dedicated and competitive players (many who had represented the region and a handful of internationals). Playing good players is important to improve our own levels. It would be nice to see similar event down here in the sticks (Kirklees). We have a terrain big enough with a good clubhouse; we have capable organisers; we have an empty calendar for 2018. How about it Hecky?