The game of croquet is believed to have been started in Ireland although the name croquet has its origins in French. Anyway the games of croquet is played on a lawn by setting up metal hoops and the players use a wooden mallet to hit the croquet ball through the hoops that are placed in the ground. There are several versions to croquet and its rules. The oldest English croquet club is the Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club that hosts the annual Wimbledon Tennis Championship tournament.
There are 12 metal loops that are placed in the playing area and players try and hit the croquet ball through the prescribed croquet hoop. A player can also use an opponent’s ball to ‘roquet’ off another ball. If a player ‘roquets’ another ball he or she gets a continuation shot and can get another roquet or a hit. A hit is counted when the ball passes through the loop. The player who clears all twelve loops and then hits the target is declared the winner. A croquet set has four colored balls and two or four mallets and two balls are lighter colored like yellow and red and two have darker colors like green and black. One player or team will use the lighter color balls and the other the dark colored balls. There can be more then four balls in a croquet set and a common croquet set has 6 balls and 6 mallets some mallets have plastic coated heads and the colors are the same as the color of the balls. The croquet balls are made of hard plastic and one can get a croquet set for around in cheap as well as in expensive prices. Some sports goods stores have annual croquet set sale and one can easily get a good round croquet set in these sales. A croquet set of croquet balls, mallets and hoops is also called a round croquet set. Normally the handle and the hammer of the croquet mallets are in two pieces and the handle has to be screwed into the mallet head. There are antique croquet sets also available but these are mostly bought and kept as a display and are not used to play with.
Croquet is quite popular in England, New Zealand, Australia, Canada and USA and there are national and international competitions that are held. Croquet requires a nice even lawn and one can play this in the front yard lawn or in the backyard lawn also. If one does not know how to setup the croquet loops one can get a diagram of how croquet is set up.
Croquet was a popular game in which both men and women participated and was played by the English nobility as a Sunday pastime. It can be termed as a mixture of golf and polo and there are a number of variations regarding the rules by which it is played in the countries where it is popular.
There is a number of croquet set makers and some of them make professional standard croquet sets. Jacques croquet sets are used in tournaments and animal croquet sets are very popular with younger children. The metal hoops have plastic painted shapes of different animals on them and the child learns to hit the croquet ball through these animal figured hoops. This makes it much more interesting for the children and younger children really enjoy it. In fact some parents also get quite excited about joining the kids in their game.
Croquet does not need any formal ground or space to be played in and one can easily play croquet in the backyard as long as there is some reasonably level space available. After a game is finished one just has to pull out the hoops and clean the mud of them and store them. Most croquet sets come with a container or kit bag and one just has to put them in it.
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