The playing field of London's Roe-hampton Club had been groomed to billiard-table smoothness for the 76th annual croquet (in England, rhymes with pokey) championship of the world. Four enterprising foreigners—two Irishmen, an Australian and a South African—had managed to get entered among the 41 starters. But they went down quietly, and after that it was an All-England affair. The finalists, tall, willowy 45-year-old defending Champion H. O. Hicks (five-time winner since 1932) and stout 60-year-old Geoffry Reckitt, put on what most spectators decided was an "awfully good show."
In the first game Hicks set a fast pace. Using an unorthodox side stroke,...
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