2023: Semi-finalists & coronation challenge
We got to the semis and won the new challenge trophy (the King Charles III coronation).
The big day was on the 07/04/23, the weather was sunny & a glorious day as promised by the forecast.
We arrived around 9:30am and as the day unveiled, we started to see familiar faces; organisers, teams & their friends & families. We were pleased to see the 49ers team back this year.
This year we have a new & young team member Djamel who replaced his sister Amalia. Djamel has been coming to the tournament since 2016, a keen player, helper & nobbler (helping referee to collect & count marbles): Now Djamel gets to play centre stage.
For the team event, we won the first games comfortably; till the quarter-final where we met the 49ers. We managed to beat them after Halim had a good break (14). It could have been tricky if Darren happened to have a good break too. In the semi-final, we met our arch-rivals from Germany; the 1st MC; and this time they were quicker off the mark than us, finishing the first round at 19-5. By then the game was more or less done. We lost by the end of the second round. So this year the main trophy is not travelling back with us. The final was between 1st MC and Black Dogs. Black Dogs won comfortably; with Colin and Monny in the drive; it was impossible for 1st MC to recover.
In the individual trophies: Golden Oldies: three of our players featured in the semi finals, Halim vs Mourad, Karim vs Paul Smith. Halim lost the final to an in-form Paul Smith. Best Lady::As this has become quite common recently, the challenge ends up between Alison & Leila. This year Alison had the upper hand and won by a single marble. Coronation (KC3) challenge: Halim won this trophy narrowly defeating Chris (1st MC). This was a fun contest to watch; the fast movement of the players (playing against the clock, 90 seconds); adding the element of “sport” to the marbles game.
The Greyhound coronation (KC3) challenge is a new game/trophy set in commemoration of this year’s King Charles III coronation. As a marble game, it was quite original in its setup; a 90 second speed challenge where individual members try to knock as many marbles as possible either from their existing position or the edge of the ring. The six players with the highest break of the day qualified to play. The game also has a unique template to set the target marbles on the ring: The targets are set using a coronation shaped template (see photo at the top).
All in all a great & thoroughly enjoyable day.
