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We are pleased to announce that a cheque for an amazing £1500 was present to Daimon, our representative from the Royal British Legion Poppy Appeal, before the club AGM on Friday, November 25th.
The 14th Cobbetts Poppy Appeal Doubles was held at Burridge on Sunday, November 13th on a gloriously warm and sunny day. Initially the entry was restricted to 38 teamsand amazingly was full by the beginning of October! We managed to get agreement for a couple more terrains in the car park which allowed us to have 42 teams on the day. We thank all the teams for their support but especially those who made the long journeys from outside of the region, teams from Bath, Kenilworth and the Isle of Wight.
There were nine morning leagues of 4 teams and one of 6. The top 16 teams qualified to play in the main competition in the afternoon, the next 16 in the plate and the final 10 in the wooden spoon. Defending champions Steve Daykin & Phil Bradshaw were 3rd seeds after the morning leagues on 3 wins +25. This put them behind Graham Blake & Terry Rixon from the home club who were first seeds with +33 and Harrison Ash & Mike Tull (great to see him making one of his rare competition appearances) on +26.
Other league winners were Colin Crofts & Chris Turner who were equal on +24 with Mark Robertshaw & Hassi Leverett, Tony & Peter Kidd +21, Angela Brooks & Kevin Williams +14, Mike Powlesland & Tom Williams +10, Nick & Mick Hiller 2 wins +18, Frank Charlesworth & Christine Peat 2 wins +17 and Leo Black & Ray Stanton 2 wins +11.
Just before 11am play was stopped for the traditional two minutes silence for Remembrance Sunday. A big thank you to Mike Moss from Fareham who again attended especially to recite the exhortation during the act of remembrance.
The final league game did not finish until 2:25 but the afternoon knock-outs were quickly sorted and play recommenced at 2:45. While it was very unfortunate that a team had to drop out on the Saturday morning (and we send our condolences to James Ellis from Bordon for his sad loss) it did mean that there was now space for Nick and Mick Hillier to play again. Nick and Mick were part of the Botley Butchers team that played in the 6-a-side League in the 80s and 90s. They showed they weren’t too rusty, despite now only playing very occasionally, by getting through to the Main quarter-finals before losing to Graham & Terry.
Frank & Christine
Mick (and Nick)
Roz & Julie
Graham and Terry then put up a tremendous fight in their semi-final before losing 12-13 to Mark and Hassi. Tony & Peter defeated the 2021 winners, Phil & Steve, in the quarter finals and the 2020 winners Harrison & Mike in the other semi-final. Having lost in the final last year Mark Robertshaw (this time playing with Hassi) went one better beating Tony & Peter in the final.
The Main Consolage was won by the home team of Dave & Richard who beat Angela & Kevin to get revenge for their defeat in the morning league.
The Plate competition was won Eliot & Paul from Crondall who defeated the home team of Bernie & Janet in the final. The Plate Consolage was won by Josh & Tom Ince, who had made the trip over from the Isle of Wight, defeating another home team of Viv and Terri.
Dave & Rich
Angela & Kevin
Paul & Eliot
Bernie & Janet
Mike & Ali
Malcolm & Bob
Josh & Tom
Terri & Viv
The Wooden Spoon competition was won by Richard & Celia from Oxshott who won all three games with +22. Runners-up Trudy & Kevin also won all 3 of their games but were on +7.
The raffle had an amazing number of prizes, all donated, which raised a very large sum thanks to everyone’s generosity. There was also a wine raffle for a case of 12 bottles of Chablis worth £200, also very generously donated. This was won by Richard Greeves. Additionally, Dave Stubbs correctly chose Nelson in the Name the Bear competition. A big thank you to Chris Barron in the kitchen and all the other helpers who made the day such a success. Thanks to the great support shown by club members and all the visiting players, we have again reached (and surpassed!) the target of £1000 for the Poppy Appeal.
Results:
| Main | Winners | Mark Robertshaw & Hassi Leverett (Cobbetts) |
| Runners-up | Tony Kidd & Peter Kidd (Handcross) | |
| Semi-finalists | Graham Blake& Terry Rixon (Cobbetts) | |
| Semi-finalists | Mike Tull (Unattached) & Harrison Ash (Crondall) | |
| Quarter-finalists | Roz Silvester & Julie Power (Fareham) | |
| Quarter-finalists | Nick Hillier & Mike Hillier (Unattached) | |
| Quarter-finalists | Frank Charlesworth & Christine Peat (Bedouins) | |
| Quarter-finalists | Phil Bradshaw (City of Bath) & Steve Daykin (Cobbetts) | |
| Main Consolage | Winners | Dave Stubbs & Richard Greeves (Cobbetts) |
| Runners-up | Angela Brooks (Worthing) & Kevin Williams (Parley) | |
| Plate | Winners | Eliot Mortimore & Paul Myers (Crondall) |
| Runners-up | Bernie Miles & Janet Dalton (Cobbetts) | |
| Semi-finalists | Ali Stubbs & Mike Porter (Cobbetts) | |
| Semi-finalists | Bob Ainsworth & Malcolm Berrett (Worthing) | |
| Plate Consolage | Winners | Josh & Tom Ince (Bargemans Rest) |
| Runners-up | Viv Tilbury & Terri Cox (Cobbetts) | |
| Wooden Spoon | Winners | Richard Foulsham & Celia Rawlings (Oxshott) |
| Runners-up | Trudy Bishop & Kevin Jones (Portchester) | |
| 3rd | Etsil Boukhobza & Thierry Barre (Crondall) | |
| 4th | Mark White & Geoff Smith (Cobbetts) |