History
The Ramsis Cup was donated by the World Croquet Federation in 2008 to be the trophy awarded to the winners of a Golf Croquet Test Match between teams of six representing Egypt and the Rest of the World. The first Ramsis Cup Test Match was held at the Roehampton Club in London on 8 and 9 August 2008. The format was the same as that used in the MacRobertson Shield, namely nine doubles matches and twelve singles matches.
In August 2008, every one of the eight GC World Championships from 1996 to 2008 had been won by an Egyptian, including the most recent earlier in that year in South Africa where Ahmed Nasr had defeated Reg Bamford (SAF) in the final. The Egyptian team was formidable, headed by Ahmed Nasr (world champion in 2004 and 2008), Mohamed Nasr (world champion in 2006) and Khaled Younis (world champion in 1996, 1998 and 2002) together with Helmi Abdelgayed, Ahmed El Mahdi and Yasser Esmat.
The Rest of the World team was the strongest that could be found, consting of four UK-based players, namely Reg Bamford, Rutger Beijderwellen, Robert Fulford and Stephen Mulliner and two flown in from New Zealand and the USA, Chris Clarke and Sherif Abdelwahab.
Somewhat unexpectedly, and possibly aided by some wet weather on the Sunday, the Rest of the World team put on a superb performance and emerged the winners by the narrow margin 11-10. Reg Bamford had the satisfaction of securing the winning point with a straight games defeat of Ahmed Nasr and thereby gaining some revenge for his defeat earlier in the year in the world championship final.
The 2016 Test Match
Eight years have since elapsed and the WCF was delighted to respond positively to a request from the Egyptian Croquet Federation that a Ramsis Cup Test Match might be held immediately before the GC World Team Championship in May 2016. The WCF is most grateful to the Croquet Association for agreeing to act as national host and to the Hurlingham Club for providing the lawns. The event will be held on Friday 13 May and Saturday 14 May and will follow the same format as in 2008.
The following teams have been selected by the Egyptian Croquet Federation and the WCF Management Committee.
| Egypt | Ahmed Nasr |
| Hamy Erian | |
| Mohamed Karem | |
| Mohamed Nasr | |
| Mohamed Taha | |
| Amr Baher | |
| Rest of the World | Reg Bamford |
| Robert Fulford | |
| Stephen Mulliner | |
| Danny Huneycutt | |
| Sherif Abdelwahab | |
| Will Gee |