CROQUET PEOPLE: Tom Armstrong of Adelaide, South Australia, Australia CROQUET PEOPLE: Tom Armstrong of Adelaide, South Australia, Australia 27 September 2008
by Leo Nikora
World Croquet Federation Hall of Fame26 September 2008
by John Riches on Nottingham Board
Today (26th September 2008) is an important day in the [South Australia] SA croquet calendar, as the SA croquet community is celebrating the 100th birthday of Tom Armstrong. I am not sure of the age of Tom's wife, Jean, but she would be possibly only 2-3 years younger. Both are apparently in reasonably good health.
There will be a special function held this afternoon at the Brighton Croquet Club where Tom and Jean have been a driving force for much longer than most of us can remember, and it is expected that Tom will be persuaded to hit a few balls around.
Many leading players from other states and overseas made a special point of meeting Tom, and listening to his words of wisdom, whenever they visited Adelaide. Their daughter Carolyn married Neil Spooner, and both won Australian Championships due to Tom's excellent coaching.
Besides being the doyen of Australian croquet coaches, Tom was a very good player, and was a member of the state team.
He was an independent and very creative thinker who did not always (ever?) get on well with the croquet establishment of his playing days, and for the past 30 or more years refused to set foot in the [South Australia Croquet Association] SACA headquarters on Hutt Road in Adelaide.
Almost every leading SA player has owed a great deal to the coaching of Tom and Jean. When I was learning the game and had started playing at a small club in Port Pirie, 250 Km north of Adelaide, I would eagerly seek Tom's advice on many aspects of the game every time I could get to Adelaide. (He and jean could be described as "health fanatics" — no doubt a reason for their longevity — and at times he would receive visitors while sitting completely naked in his back garden to absorb the benefits of the warm sun. They followed a strict vegetarian diet and always offered me tomato sandwiches for lunch.) I would usually have many "fantastic new ideas" to tell him about, and he would invariably listen patiently, then reveal that he had thought of them all many years previously, and go on to explain why they would not work.
Tom's original thinking brought about a number of rule changes over the years, including the following two:
Tom had many amusing and half-serious "coaching principles" which I have often used and repeated, such as:
In my early days of learning from Tom, I realised and pointed out to him that when he is no longer with us all of his vast knowledge of the game will be lost. I urged him to write it all down, but I knew he would never get around to doing so, although he kept copious notes and diagrams and communications from croquet players around the world. This realisation influenced me to determine that I would start documenting the important coaching ideas so that the knowledge would not all be completely lost.
It is certainly a day worthy of celebration in the SA croquet community.
[Tony LeMoignan of St. Brelade, Jersey,UK, wrote, "Best wishes to Tom from someone he'll never have heard of, the next time you see him. He sounds like a great character."]
Many stories could be told about Tom.
He was renowned for his ability to ensure that any casual passer-by who dared to pause for even a few seconds to look over the fence around the Brighton Croquet Club lawns would in short order find themselves inside the fence, and out on the lawn with a mallet in their hands. And every such victim was assured "You have a wonderfully straight eye, and could do very well at this game. We need young people like you (regardless of their age) in our state team and international team!"
One time in the early days of my croquet career Tom was teaching me how to play breaks, and was encouraging me to think before I hit. We played a game and after Tom made 1-back I was pleased that I remembered I was entitled to a lift. I picked up a ball, took it to A-baulk and shot at my partner ball near the peg.
I missed, my ball hit hoop 6 and stopped there — my two balls in the middle of the lawn.
Tom, not one to mince words, said "John, you are stupid!"
Somewhat taken aback, I admitted that it had not been a good shot, but I could not see that I had done anything to deserve such outright condemnation.
He explain patiently that if I had had the good sense to place my ball on A-baulk in a slightly different place so that the target ball near the peg exactly "covered" hoop 6, I would have ensured that if I missed the roquet my ball could not have hit the hoop and would have gone through to a safer position on B-baulk.
I realised that he was quite right — I was indeed stupid. It was a lesson I have never forgotten.
[Russell Bretherton of London, England, UK, wrote, "Yes, he sounds like a real charac-nutter. No wonder you two got on so well. Making a mallet out of a bread board to gain a wiring lift? But that's one of the things I like about croquet — the interesting characters you meet. Eccentrics bordering on insanity, only a short roquet away from the lunatic asylum."]
It sounds as if I have painted a misleading picture of Tom.
He is not eccentric and has always had a keen analytical mind; not dominating, but always adopting a kindly manner. He has always shown great interest in any new idea presented by even the most raw beginner.
In his playing and coaching days he did not suffer fools gladly. He deplored bad laws and incompetent refereeing. Like most Australians, he believed in playing rigidly to the rules, with little regard for spirits or traditions. He spoke slowly and deliberately, with his pronouncements always giving the impression of great wisdom — certainly nothing "bordering on insanity".
It is probably unfair to him to place Tom and me in similar categories.
10 November 2006
Brighton Croquet Club, Victoria, Australia
by Ian Henschke on Australian Broadcasting Company
Australia's had more than its fair share of extraordinary sporting figures: Don Bradman in cricket, Dawn Fraser in swimming and Herb Elliott in athletics. Now we can add the name of Tom Armstrong for croquet. He's just been named as one of only five people to be inducted into the World Croquet Federation Hall of Fame. At 98 years of age he still heads off to the Brighton Croquet Club twice a week and that's where I caught up with him.
Tom Armstrong first picked up a croquet mallet in the 1960s when his wife Jean took up the game after giving up tennis. Back then there were very few men playing but he soon changed that. The retired medical rep went on to play for the state, but the salesman in him quickly turned him into the best coach in the nation and a great promoter for the game.
TOM ARMSTRONG, CROQUET HALL OF FAME: I enjoy persuading people. I like someone to look over the fence and stop for a minute and then I talk to them, and soon I have them with a mallet in their hand and from that point the game takes over.
IAN HENSCHKE: When Tom's wife Jean, a brilliant player and coach herself, was playing in the 60s most men were happy to watch from the sidelines. Tom soon convinced them to give the game he says is a cross between billiards and chess a go.
JEAN ARMSTRONG, FORMER CROQUET CHAMPION: Of course there's a women's team and a men's team.
IAN HENSCHKE: Were you proud when he was inducted into the International Hall of Fame?
JEAN ARMSTRONG: Very. We haven't got an Internet, we haven't seen him on it yet. He had to send a picture, head and shoulders. Yes, it's a terrific honour. This is the World Croquet Federation. We're both on the Australian one but that's chicken feed compared to the world. And there were five inducted this year and three of them are dead, three dead people. He's one of the two live ones.
CREINA DAWSON, CROQUET PLAYER: I made the mistake of picking my mother up at the croquet club one afternoon and was taken in by Tom and a mallet put in my hand and "Oh, you're going to be a great champion" he said.
IAN HENSCHKE: And his prediction came true. Creina Dawson is one of Tom's most successful protégés. He started coaching her in 1970 and since then she has won the croquet trifecta, taking out the New Zealand, Australian and England titles. She's also since discovered that Tom tells almost everyone he coaches they've got the makings of a champion.
CREINA DAWSON: It's lucky that I started with the best coach right from the start and for now, something like 36 years, he's been my mentor, my coach and my inspiration.
IAN HENSCHKE: Apart from his induction into the Hall of Fame, Tom Armstrong's also been awarded the Australian Sports Medal for Sporting Achievement in 2000, and six years before that the Australian Coaching Council formally recognised his coaching of thousands of players over almost 50 years. Why is he such a good coach?
CREINA DAWSON: I think because he's very quietly unassuming but very determined to get the best out of people.
IAN HENSCHKE: Tom reckons he's given up coaching, is that true?
BETTY BROADBENT, CROQUET PLAYER: No way. No way. Sometimes you get on that court and you stop and you think "What's the next step, what should I be doing?" and Tom says "Hit the damn ball" and that's what you do.
IAN HENSCHKE: What have you got out of the game then, a lot of personal pleasure?
TOM ARMSTRONG: That's all.
JEAN ARMSTRONG: No money.
TOM ARMSTRONG: Certainly no money.
JEAN ARMSTRONG: This is for love, no money.
TOM ARMSTRONG: No money, everything done for love.