By CASEY NEILL
DANDENONG Croquet Club hosted its final match last week ending its 90-plus year tenure in Dandenong Park.
President Bill Jacobs has been with the club for five years but said others had been members for more than three decades and left with broken hearts on Tuesday 28 April.
“It was a very sad day.
“We tried to keep on the bright side but it was a sad day,” he said.
The closure followed the neighbouring Dandenong City Bowling Club playing its last end in February this year.
City of Greater Dandenong had offered to relocate the clubs and a kindergarten so it could demolish the buildings use the site in a redevelopment of the park.
But the impending closure made it hard for the croquet club to hold onto its already-dwindling membership base.
“We had a meeting in mid-February where we just knew we couldn’t keep going, so we decided to close at the end of April,” Mr Jacobs said.
“We would have only kept about six people in a relocation. It would have been impossible to pay for everything.”
Member Joan, 90, will continue to play croquet with a Ringwood club while Mr Jacobs and several team mates will move to Frankston.
“It’s a fun game and it’s social and you get out in the open air and you meet people,” he said.
“You have to be very accurate and it’s a very competitive game as well.”
Members planned to dine at Hallam Hotel on Saturday as a final farewell but Mr Jacobs said they’d all stay in touch.
“The people who belong to the club have been the best gang of mates and supporters a bloke could ever have,” he said.
