Capetonian Reg Bamford: Croquet titan now swings into invention

Croquet may conjure images of British lawns and cucumber sandwiches. Or, if you’ve read Alice in Wonderland, you might recall the phrase “Off with their heads!” - with the Queen using flamingos as mallets, hedgehogs as balls, and playing cards as hoops. These aren’t images typically associated with South Africans, who are more known for their sporting prowess on rugby fields, cricket pitches, and in swimming pools. And yet, one of the world’s greatest croquet players, Reg Bamford from Cape Town, who first picked up a mallet at the age of four in Rondebosch, has just claimed his 13th British Golf Croquet Open Championship title - adding to a glittering list of accolades that includes multiple world championships. Although he has lived in the UK for years, Bamford continues to represent South Africa on the international stage. Most recently, he captained the national team at the World Croquet Championships in Tasmania, securing their place in the sport’s top tier. Bamford, who is also the founder of immigration specialists Sable International, told Biznews in an interview that he’s becoming an inventor, developing a sleek, portable swing trainer designed to help players perfect their technique. A prototype, he tells us, will be available soon.

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Edited transcript of the interview

Linda van Tilburg (00:04.609)

Now here's a sport you'd associate with a British aristocracy, not with South Africa, a country known for rugby, cricket and swimming. That's our turf. Still, a South African born in Cape Town has just clinched the British GC Open Championship for a staggering 13th time. His name is Reg Bamford, perhaps better known to our Biznews audience as the founder of Sable International, and he joins us in the studio today. Hi, Reg. Nice to see you.

Reg Bamford (00:43.508)

Hi Linda, very nice to see you too.

Linda van Tilburg (00:45.731)

Got a bit sunburned there on the croquet pitch, I see.

Reg Bamford (00:48.884)

Well, we had some fantastic weather down in the south of England, and unfortunately, I didn't wear any sunscreen, so I got really burnt.

Linda van Tilburg (00:59.628)

Well, I've been speaking to people about the weather here. It's 34-35 degrees with 70% humidity. I'm sure we all got sunburned.

Reg Bamford (01:12.394)

So, two years ago, I played in the World Championship Semi-Final. It was a best-of-five, which this tournament wasn't. I didn't wear a cap or a hat, because I didn't think that was too much of an issue. And it was the longest match ever played in the World Championship, lasting 10 and a half hours, and it was played in 35-degree Celsius weather. And I lost it, probably because I was so dehydrated and sunburnt, and I've learnt my lesson.

Linda van Tilburg (01:47.79)

I thought a Capetonian would know better. 

Linda van Tilburg (01:52.478)

That's such an impressive achievement. Congratulations. How does that feel?

Reg Bamford (01:58.496)

No, it feels awesome for several reasons. So, I won the bulk of my British Open titles over the last 15 or 20 years. More recently, the game has become a lot more competitive. There are a lot more youngsters playing. So, of the last 16, eight of them, nine of them would have been the age of 13 now in the world of croquet, that's quite extraordinary because we are talking about a sport that is typically associated with slightly older people. That said, the current world champion is 17 years old, and I suppose that's why

I'm particularly pleased about this because I hadn't won it in over five years. I'm now 57 years old, but I've been playing the game for 50 years. It was a mental challenge for me to determine if I still have what it takes to compete at the highest levels. I put in a considerable amount of effort, and I'm very pleased to say that I came out on top.

Linda van Tilburg (03:13.678)

Wow, and you still represent South Africa on the world stage as well. So, how has that team been performing internationally?

Reg Bamford (03:21.171)

Yeah, so look, it's not a very big sport down there. In January of this year, I captained the team. We sent a team of four to Tasmania to participate in the World Team Championships. And it was the top eight countries in the world. We didn't have lofty ambitions. We didn't want to go and win the thing because we couldn't. We don't have the strongest players. But there is automatic relegation. So, we were desperate not to finish in last place. However, we finished sixth, which was quite good, so that keeps us in the top tier for the next four years.

Linda van Tilburg (04:07.19)

So are there clubs in South Africa?

Reg Bamford (04:09.567)

There are ten croquet clubs. The most well-known is Kelvin Grove. There are three or four courts, and they're scattered around the country now.

Linda van Tilburg (04:25.142)

So, croquet, why did you develop a love of that sport?

Reg Bamford (04:30.911)

So, I started playing when I was seven years old. My parents knew some dear friends of theirs who had a farm in the Karoo, and we would visit once or twice a year. They had a beautiful homestead and a lovely front garden. It had a tilt and a slope to it with a big green bush in the middle, but they would always set out a croquet court there, and that was my first exposure to croquet. And as it happens, these things occur due to a set of circumstances. 

As it happened, the Rondebosch Croquet Club was two or three hundred yards from my house in Cape Town, where I had played very social croquet on this front lawn. I then saw the Rondebosch Croquet Club, where I saw all these people wearing whites. As a very competitive person, I said, 'Dad, I want to go and play against those people there.' He took me along on Saturday morning. I must have been the youngest person they'd seen playing croquet. I joined in 1974.

Linda van Tilburg (05:54.836)

And on top of that, I see you've developed something called, what is it called? A special trainer for Croquet players with a prototype coming out soon.

Reg Bamford (06:05.503)

You've done your research here. This was a device that I built many years ago. The croquet swing only moves along one plane, unlike a golf swing, which is a lot more complicated. So, the croquet swing is on one plane. It's a contraption that controls the plane, allowing one's backswing and forward swing to occur on a single plane. If you can use that and train your swing when you put under pressure or where there's some outside factors like stress or pressure or wind or rain or temperature where you have trained your muscles in a certain way you're much more likely to swing straight if you swing straight you're going to hit the wall straight so it's straightforward.

Linda van Tilburg (07:05.931)

So, where do you plan to go with this?

Reg Bamford (07:08.479)

That's quite interesting because I've set up a little company that is going to market the swing trainer. I think that the croquet clubs around the world might be interested in it. And in particular, the US market would be the most acceptable place to try...

Linda van Tilburg (07:34.102)

So, how popular is croquet worldwide?

Reg Bamford (07:38.816)

Look, it's still considered a minority sport. It's not in the Olympics. But more people, funnily enough, are playing it. In the past, it has always had a brand reputation of sorts, akin to Alice in Wonderland, with gin and tonics, and all that sort of thing, and a slightly quirky sports image. And certainly, for many, many years, I've been teased by the fact that I've played croquet because I'm a big, tall South African guy.

I shouldn't be playing croquet; I should have played rugby or something like that. However, it's becoming increasingly popular. It's a very fast-growing sport here in England. The version of the game is very different to what it was 20 or 30 years ago. They've changed the rules; it's much more competitive and appealing.

And it's a game that is very much suited to people who stopped playing tennis, stopped playing golf, because those are quite physical games, quite difficult games to play. Croquet is a very sociable sport. You can play it for most of your life. I'm 57 years old. I've probably got another 15 years of playing at the highest level. It is a sport where you can continue to play competitive sports right up until the age of 65 or 70.

Linda van Tilburg (09:16.692)

Well, is it easy to find clubs? Because we were talking about golf. You know, it's quite a long day. You've got to find a golf course, and it's expensive.

Reg Bamford (09:25.739)

Yes, golf will take around four or five hours to play. You have to get to the golf course. It's quite expensive because the set of golf clubs might cost you £ 1,500. Being a member of a club is quite costly, and you're only playing with three people for four or five hours, whereas in croquet, it's a lot of fun to attend one of these tournaments. When you're meeting a whole bunch of different people, I know all the players there. A game can be quick, taking about an hour or so. There are numerous benefits, including being outside, which provides mental stimulation, and you can get your 5,000 steps in per game. So, there are lots of benefits.

Linda van Tilburg (10:16.297)

If somebody wants to pick up a mallet and wants to do it, what's your pitch to them? Why should they do it?

Reg Bamford (10:22.559)

I think it's the best game on earth. It might not be the game that people want to watch on TV, but when you play it outside, it's very healthy for you, as you get some exercise, and it provides mental stimulation. It's a straightforward game, so it's a game that you can pick up in five minutes.

The season here typically starts in April and runs through September. For six months of the year, there's a season here, and you can attend some of these tournaments, where you'll be most welcome. So, for those people who are thinking of playing croquet, I would thoroughly recommend

Linda van Tilburg (11:12.008)

So what's next for you? More competitions?

Reg Bamford (11:15.583)

Yes, next month I'm heading to Spain to compete in the Spanish Open. The following week, I travel to Cairo to participate in the Cairo Open. That's a tournament that I played in five or six times. I've never won it before. And I would always consider that the Everest of Croquet tournaments. I'd love to go out there to win.

When they see me coming, they pull out all the stops to stop me from winning their tournament, and they find that the most stimulating challenge. I'm pretty friendly with all of them, but the moment I step onto the court, there they are, desperate to beat me. That's taking place next month, and then in November, I'm going over to Palm Beach to play in the World Championships, and I hope to go and do

Linda van Tilburg (12:05.224)

You mentioned earlier that for Americans; it's quite a posh game there.

Reg Bamford (12:10.623)

It's not posh in the sense of the sort of land and gentry that play it, but they typically have croquet clubs that are associated with golf courses and golf clubs. So, they're finding a lot of new members coming in who are perhaps golf widows or people who have stopped playing golf, and it makes a lot of sense because the golf club has got the setup and produces beautiful lawns. They've got the greenkeepers to make the lawns look pretty nice. Several quite nice images of croquet and golf seem to be closely linked now.

Linda van Tilburg (13:05.959)

Well, good luck with all this. Thank you, Reg Bramford, for speaking to us.

Reg Bamford (13:11.871)

Thanks for the interview.