Sat 14th Oct Report by Mike
The Bottle Challenge was held on the middle Saturday of October in surprisingly warm and fine weather. The players this year were Rachel, Will, Nick, Tim, Arthur, Chris, Ray, Mike and Guest player Ian Burridge. This was probably the strongest field so far in this tournament. It was the usual all-play-all format with Chris and Mike sharing a place.
We have had some very high standards of play in the past but never in so many games as we experienced this year. Going into the last round the top five players each had five wins but only Rachel, Will, Tim and Ian could win due to hoop difference. The last round key results were Rachel beating Nick and Will beating Ian. Rachel won overall having a hoop difference of one over Will.
The Ashby players gave it everything in this tournament and we should be proud of them.
The Indoor Bottle Challenge in the evening was equally competitive with Nick beating Rachel and Will beating Tim in the semi-finals. Will was the overall winner beating Nick 8 – 6 to win the champagne. Mike rather foolishly challenged Will to a playoff for a magnum of champagne and lost. I suspect this is a challenge which is unlikely to be repeated next year.
