Tomorrow it starts, one week of pleasure. Im not putting any expectations on my shoulders regarding medals. I just gonna have fun, relax and do my best in every boule. Maby it will take me to a medal. We are starting with Mixed Triplets tomorrow morning. And over the week ill play, mixed double, double, triplets and single as the last class. Maby i skip single this year. Depends on how tired i am in the end of the week. Had some pain in my back for several months to so this will also be a part of my decision for the singles. Ill try to update my games here and reflections over the week. Maby i need some mental advice along the week 😂😎. And if the petanque turns to crap, ill do some Beer reviews instead 😂😂🍺🍺😂😂 Cheers!

I was playing in a melee yesterday and had a decent player and we were against two very strong players. With me pointing and him being arrogant we found ourselves in deep trouble at 12 - 1 down. I asked to switch and after a little discussion where I pointed out it couldn’t get any worse and he was missing loads he agreed to swop. Slowly we started to come back, one point at a time with me hitting boule after boule and getting lots of carreau. The fun part was when we won our second point to make it 12 -2 I remarked “pas morte” which was greeted with immense hilarity by everyone watching and the players. It came down to the last boule every end, time after time I had to play a miracle and I managed to pull it off each end. Every time we won another point I said the same thing…..pas morte. The next thing it was 12 - 12 and we had a large crowd as we were holding up the entire melee. I had a situation where they were lying 3 after a dodgy cochonnet movement and there was no feasible way I could beat 2 of the points. So I lobbed onto the jack and moved it to our boule and we won the game! The crowd at this point went crazy. This melee happens every week with over 100 players turning up and it was a very memorable game. It’s never over until someone hits 13! Do you have any similar stories?

I hope you all have had a chance to watch last week’s training with Steve and myself. The remainder of the sessions will be for paid members and you can easily upgrade to access this and much more going forward.

We played the third round of the cup today — and funny enough, it was against my former team. I was actually looking forward to seeing some of the old folks again. On paper we were clear favorites, but organizing a full squad for the day turned out to be difficult. Personally, I wasn’t planning to play at all. After a long pétanque weekend the week before, I wanted to spend this one with my kids and partner. But since we were short on players, I signed up — sorry family. Têtes-à-têtes After the Têtes we were already behind, winning only one out of six games. My own game was a strange one. I played on the outer court, which was noticeably tilted. I tried several times to place the cochonnet close to the lower sideline, knowing my opponent usually plays high balls and that the terrain could cause trouble. But every time, the cochonnet bounced back toward the middle, and my game plan fell apart. The game stayed fairly open. When I finally managed to land the cochonnet at the sideline, my opponent scored three points — suddenly I was down 8:10. Next mène, I answered with a cracking carreau sur place, scoring three points: 11:10. At 11:11, my opening boule was far too long, and my opponent placed his boule perfectly in front of the cochonnet, maybe 5 cm. I had to choose: shoot or point. It was a tough decision and took me a moment, but in the end I decided to shoot, hoping to send the cochonnet out of play. I missed and lost the game. Afterwards, I was asked by the my own team player who won his Tête, why I chose to shoot. I told him that my shooting had been solid throughout the game and I was confident I’d hit. Looking back, I’d make the same decision again. Would you have chosen too shoot? Doublettes & Triplettes In the Doublettes we won two out of three — I played well as pointer — but we were still behind overall, so we needed both Triplettes. Knowing the opponent team inside out, I expected them to field their strongest players in the Mixed Triplette. We countered with what we believed was our best lineup: our lady plus my Doublette. We won our game against strong opponents, but unexpectedly lost the other Triplette.

Hi Kevin, I really enjoy your coverage of Mondial la Marseillaise on Youtube, thank you