Brighton and Hove Petanque Club

2nd Round – BHPC versus The Welcome Stranger

This knockout competition is to find the top 4 club teams in England who will then play off in a separate event to find the overall winning club. The winning club will represent the EPA at the Confédération de Européenne Pétanque (CEP) European Cup for Club Teams competition. All clubs registered with the EPA with a minimum of 6 members (one of which must be of the opposite gender to the other 5) are automatically entered in the draw. Each club is allowed one team. All players must be EPA members for the current year and hold their membership through BHPC to play for BHPC.

Our squad is as follows :-
Main squad of 6
Ray Ager                                            David Alfred
Janice Doherty                                Norman Hazelden
Fergal Hogan                                    Tony Mann
2 reserves
Pat Connolly                                     Terry Gibbons

In the 1st Round we were drawn against The Junction Inn who withdrew so we received a walkover into round 2 where we faced our friends from The Welcome Stranger. The match was played on Sunday 22nd November at the PST. The conditions were atrocious with relentless strong winds and horizontal rain. With Norman unavailable Pat was brought into the squad.

Each match consists of 7 games played over 3 rounds as follows :-
Round 1 – Triples – 1 mixed & 1 open
Round 2 – Doubles – 1 mixed & 2 open
Round 3 – Triples – 1 mixed & 1 open
Teams are awarded 1 point for each game won and therefore the team with the most points (or wins) after the 7 games is the match winner.

Our Mixed Triples team in round 1 consisted of Janice, David & Fergal & they were up against Sonia, Rob & Herbie. It was a close game but the Welcome Stranger won by 13-7. In the Open Triples Pat, Ray & Tony faced Adam, Mick & Geoff who quickly established a 6-3 lead. In the next end Pat put in a great first point and they shot twice and missed. Their following points were some distance away and with our 5 remaining boules our team got “le sac” (a 6 point end) making it 9-6 to us. In the next and what proved to be a final end our team scored 4 to win the match 13-6.

So after the 1st round it was one game to each club. The next round was the doubles round. Our mixed doubles were Janice & David who played Sonia & Rob. Our open doubles pairings were Fergal & Tony who played Mick & Herbie and Pat & Ray who played Geoff & Adam.

Pat & Ray finished their game first with a 13-8 win putting BHPC 2 games to 1 up. Fergal & Tony struggled in their game and lost 8-13  making it 2 games all overall. However Janice & David won 13-5 to put BHPC in a 3-2 lead before we were due to break for lunch and some respite from the weather.

However one of the Welcome Stranger’s squad was not feeling well and the weather conditions were not helping and they offered to concede the match. Offers of lunch in the warmth of the Iron Duke were not taken up and it was with regret that the last 2 games of the final round were conceded giving BHPC a 5 games to 2 victory.

So we progress through to the 3rd round where we have another home tie against our friends from the Crowborough Social Club who received a walkover in the 2nd round as the Bricklayers Arms couldn’t field a team.

This match will take place in early January and we hope for everyone’s sake that we have better weather !