News & Results 2009 Page 2

To all.

As most of you will know by now young Liam Fairhurst sadly lost his fight against cancer. During his short life Liam not only raised £350,000 for CLICSargeant but his inspired all who met him with his courage and outlook on life. Once again this years event at Tattersalls is for CLICSargeant so I am asking all N.D.P.L members and all our friends in Suffolk and Norfolk leagues to step up and help make this years competition one of the best as our tribute to a brave young man. So find a partner and come along and help us make the day a success.

Cheers Ken, Tricia & Mick.

Wanderers St Faiths Petanque Club celebrated their 25th Anniversary year with a Nine Boule Triples tournament at the St Faiths Centre on the day of their summer fayre.

The event attracted 24 triples including 65% present and past members, plus representatives from the Bob Carter Centre, Diss, Exning, Fifty-One, Norwich and Sprowston clubs. Interesting to note that twenty-four of the participants including four juniors have represented or qualified to represent the Anglia Region this year.

Proceeding commenced at noon with refreshments served to participants, supporters and members of the St Faiths Centre Management Committee.

Chairperson Louise Robinson, a Committee Member for 22 years welcomed all in attendance and summarised the Club's history before presentations were made to her and the Club's founders Ted Hamlin and Bob Urquhart.

Following a random draw the first of five timed forty-five minute rounds commenced and how pleasing it was to see some of our former players returning to the game.

It was apparent from the start that the competition would be evenly contested and this proved to be the case with only two teams boosting a 100% record after just three rounds.

At the conclusion three teams finished with four wins and high points differentials.

Graham Beales - Claudine Guilmain - Fleur Guilmain-Beales finished fifth with plus 25 including a narrow 9-10 defeat to the team placed sixteenth.

In fourth place were Glen Harcourt - Paul Critten - Glen Fusco with a plus 29 that included a single point loss at 8-9 to the ultimate runners-up.

After suffering a first round 10-13 loss to the winners Stuart Picton and comparative newcomers Kim Picton and Jamie Rushmere recovered to claim third place with plus 31.

The runners-up were Daniel Brock (returning after a long break from the game), Gloria Smith and Peter Walker with four wins, a draw and plus 26 points. Their drawn game was a low scoring 5-5 against former National Pairs Champion Sarah Urquhart partnered by Dave Robinson and Joan Bowman.

It was probably fitting that the family combination of Bob, Lynne and Chloe Urquhart should claim victory on this occasion, one being a founder member, another Secretary and the other depicting the future of the Club.

Needless to say that they with James were very much involved with pre-planning and terrain preparation. However they deny doctoring the surfaces to suit their style of play and neither were they involved with the tournament draw because results confirm they played four of the top eight teams with only two of the bottom five encountering marginally tougher opposition which accounts for a lower plus points differential compared to the next five teams.

In fact they were losing heavily in three of their matches and had to apply much pressure to recover, particularly in their last match against a team without a win on the day.

Presentation of trophies were made by Chairperson Louise Robinson and the Club's youngest member 7 year old Amee Kennett.

Bob Urquhart