In rather subdued circumstances 38 stags entered the Four nations competition and in a very close competition, Ireland, led this year by Ron Maudlin, retained the trophy with 287 points from a spirited revival from the Wales team, led by John D Woodward with 285 points, followed by Scotland, led by Peter Jamieson with 278 points and languishing in last place with 268 points were England, led by Tony Britton.

Best country scores were Ron Maudlin for Ireland with 38 points, Mike Gilbey for England with 38 points, Rick Pedrick for Scotland with 41points and David Spillane for Wales and overall winner on the day with 42 points.

Full teams performances are as follows.

The Stags Summer Away day took place on Wednesday 6th July at Nuneaton Golf Club AND IT DID NOT RAIN!

The course was challenging but in fine nick. Bacon Rolls were terrific and the 28 Stags plus three guests enjoyed the day tremendously. This was down on previous years which was a pity but affected by a late Covid withdrawal and a withdrawal by a Stag injuring himself doing DIY. (will they ever learn!!) Some good scores were returned which is slightly unusual for an Away Day but conditions allowed the ball to roll and roll and those who mastered the very tricky putting surface did very well. Lunch was good as was the after lunch discussion about matches next year, thanks for the feedback. Robin Whitehouse generously donated four bottles of wine to augment the prizes and narrowly lost both the nearest the pin and longest drive competitions. The longest drive was won by Jim Jobson and the nearest the pin by Phil Youett. In third place in the competition was Robin Cathcart, in second place was Dave Lole but the winner of the Summer Cup was Paul Steward who won by one shot and had the distinction of his golf ball never going above 6 feet high during his round. well done to Paul. The captain presented the prizes to the winners. Full results were as follows

There was a tremendous response to the Captains Day by the Stags. 17 teams of 4 entered the competition, 19 holes were sponsored, 30 prizes were given for nearest the pin and longest drive competitions and 15 prizes were donated for the raffle. In all

£ 2045 was raised for the Captains Charity, The British Heart Foundation, which was a tremendous effort. Thanks to all the Stags who donated prizes, entered the competition, bought raffle tickets, sponsored holes; your efforts were tremendous.

Before the main competition a presentation was made to the correct winner of the Stags nett championship, Ron Maudlin. He was late for the presentation!

The competition on the day was won by Terry Wing, Dick Brown, John Astle and Bill Crofts.

The Red Ball competition was won by Steve Hyland, Steve Waugh, Nick Kirby and Julian Westwood.

Winners of hole prizes and raffle prizes are shown below

Full results of main competition and Red Ball competition (only 9 teams returned their red balls) are shown below.

Nearest the pin in 3 over 70 years Terry Devlin

" The Stags Championship was played on Monday 6th and 13th June in good weather with some wind. Some really excellent golf was played and some really bad golf. Some very high individual hole scores were made and some very consistent golf played bt many. The best three nett scores over the two rounds were our Captain, David Gibbs with a 63, Mick Jephcott with a 64 and Bill Crofts with a 66. Perhaps the unluckiest golfer was Ron Maudlin with two net rounds of 68 but suffered by having a shot deducted from his handicap after his first round. Without that deduction he would have won the nett championship. However he also distinguished himself by not falling behind the group in front so the lesson is, Ron, faster play works!!!

Dick Brown was very consistent over the two rounds and just managed to pip Ron for the nett championship with a better second round.

Stewart Taylor retained his gross championship with a combined gross of 160 just holding off a late challenge from Alan Brushett who had the best gross round of the tournament with a 77.

Thank you for all those who stayed after the golf for the presentation"

"It has not rained for months and one sure way of guaranteeing rain is to have a Stags Spring away day, especially if it is held in Leicestershire. And sure enough the groundkeepers wish (have you seen him doing the rain dance each afternoon about 6pm?) came true or at least in did in Ullesthorpe.

36 brave souls turned up even though the forecast was constant rain with intermittent storms. A lot of moaning but that is not unusual for Stags. To satisfy one of the Stags family commitments we sent him out first and unfortunately it was a three ball. According to them they finished an hour and ten minutes ahead of the next group who had been affected by an equipment malfunction (as well as a wimpish Stag) and two of that group had to share the task of pushing the wimp's trolley for the last nine holes. I think he must have had lead bars in the bag.

We were blessed by the appearance of the bard although his golf has deteriorated since he left for Llandudno but it was great to see him and it is a pity he is still not writing these reports.

We started with superb bacon rolls and good coffee and high anticipation tempered by a concern that the wetware may not be sufficient for what was coming.

However general good humour persisted, or perhaps it was gallows humour! The course was wet, something we haven't seen for weeks and long with many very long par fours. Scoring was therefore not brilliant. Persistent rain for our opening nine holes, was followed by a break in the rain when wet ware was discarded and the sun hoped for. The "dry" lasted about three holes before the wind got up, black clouds enveloped the skies, and really heavy rain started which caused all the Stags to re-don wet ware and run for the trees. This was the clearing up shower and later groups were able to dry out a bit in the late afternoon sun.

The lunch was served on a rolling basis and was coq au vin and al dente vegetables. Our resident master chef refuted the claim that it was coq au vin as evidently the coq had not been marinated in red wine for the appropriate time. You get all sorts!!

Prize giving followed with the nearest the pin won by Mick Brown, longest drive (the marker found after most Stags third shot) was won by Martin Darbey. In fourth place with 32 points was Jim Jobson, third was Bernie Ray with better back 3, second was basher Darbey with better back 9 and the winner with 33 points was Rohit Shah who also won the Bill Collier Cup, the first time it had been played for for four years.

The prizes were presented by a Past Stags Captain, the estimable John D Woodward. Now many of the more recent Stags may not know that John was a captain as his photo is not displayed in the rogue's gallery in the Changing Rooms. This is because John is notably shy and does not like his photo taken in case he is mistaken for Dorian Gray. We are attempting to rectify this so watch this space (or indeed the rogues gallery)

Scores on the day were as follows