No fewer than 20 players took part in this event held on 21st and 26th September to determine who would go through to the final which it is hoped will be played on Sunday 8th October following the friendly fixture with Leighton Linslade. Ten players each day were split into 2 blocks of 5 with an all play all in each block of 7 complete hoops with a winner and runner-up going through from each grouping before those successful would play eliminating best of 13 hoop games before a finalist emerged. On both days the weather behaved, the sun shone, and, gratifyingly, there have been several reports of how much members enjoyed the games. In Block A John Skuse (4 wins) and David Dawsey (2 wins) qualified for the quarter finals whilst Joan and Len can feel rather unfortunate in that they each won 2 games but David had a superior hoop difference. Block B resulted in a tie in terms of games won with Linda Murrell and Bob Jones each winning 3 games out of the 4 played. Linda, however, won the group by the narrow margin of +4 hoops to Bob’s +2. Quarter final scores could not have been closer: David 7 Linda 6 and John 7 Bob 6. Finally John played David to determine who would go through to the final. By their own admittance both played well but John, having taken an early lead, seemingly could do no wrong and hands (not throats) were shaken after 7 hoops. Blocks C and D were played on the 26th with Karen Jones winning the first block with wins in all 4 games whilst John Mariner with 3 wins was the runner-up. Pleasingly Sue McDonald, Betty Craig and Janis Owen all won a game and they shared the honours of coming 3rd with identical hoop differences. Block D turned out to be quite exciting in that Tony Frewin and Tess Gossett each won 3 games and had an identical hoop difference of +8. As Tess had beaten Tony by 4 hoops to 3 she went through as winner of the block with Tony as runner-up. In the quarter finals Tony, rather surprisingly had a straightforward 7-1 win over Karen whilst John M after gaining an early lead over Tess was taken to the 12th hoop before winning 7-5. The semi-final between Tony and John M was watched by a crowd in double figures (just) and proved to be an exciting contest. John led 5-3 before Tony levelled taking the next two hoops. John won the 11th but Tony managed to jaws his red ball in the 12th hoop. John’s decision after playing black took some by surprise. Instead of trying to jump red with his blue from about 10ft he simply smashed red to the boundary. Tony, possibly taken aback by this opportunity to have first ball to the 13th hit well but not well enough as the red came to rest 3ft from the hoop. John’s black finished 9ft in front of the hoop and, after a brief exchange of shots he won the hoop and took his place in the final.