The Autumn Meeting and AGM of the Society will be held at The Berkshire on 04 September.  At the AGM, Barry Lane, who has been our outstanding secretary, will be standing down.  Let's have a big turnout for this meeting to thank Barry for all his hard work over the last 33 years.

Following his three years as Halford Hewitt Manager, Mark Peters has handed the reigns over to Ameet Patel.  He will take charge of the Grafton and Hewitt teams starting with the Grafton qualifier at Royal Wimbledon on the 28th April.  We all thank Mark for taking the Hewitt side forward during his tenure and wish Ameet every success and hopefully some silverware!!!

Dulwich lost to Lancing in the Halford Hewitt by 3 matches to 2 at Deal today.   Ruwan Nanyakara & Matt Aldous and Ameet Patel & Alex Charawani won their matches while Mark Peters & Nick Howe lost on the 18th green.

Seventy members and guests enjoyed the Annual Dinner at The East India club on Thursday, 8th March. Among the guests were THE MASTER, Sir Peter Duffell, President of The Alleyn club, and John Uzielli, President of the Public Schols Golfing Society. 
Entertaining speeches were given by Stuart Southgate of the Old Johnians and Pat Pocock of England and Surrey. The Captain Roger Walker gave a brief summary of the last year together with one or two entertaining stories.
 

Mark Peters, our Halford Hewitt captain has selected a strong Dulwich team for this year's competition.  The team is Chris Brock, Paul Kimber, Ruwan Nanyakara, Matt Aldous, David Somerville, Geoffrey Eclair-Heath, Mark Peters, Nick Howe, Ameet Patel, Alex Charawani and Nick Owen.

Dulwich's first round match is against Lancing at Deal at 9.45 on Thursday, 29 March.  As always the team benefits from your support so get down if you can.

The OAGS took on Royal Cinque Ports in the annual fixture at Deal on Saturday, 24 February.  This match is always a good challenge for our Halford Hewitt contenders.  This year was no different:  The course was playing long after some overnight rain and the wind was light but strong enough to make a difference.

In the morning, Cinque Ports had a slight advantage, winning the foursomes 3 - 2.  After a wonderful lunch in the clubhouse, the afternoon matches were a little closer, but the locals were stronger winning three matches to Dulwich's two for a final score of 6 - 4.

This was the 25th year of this fixture.  It is always a good mix of challenging foursomes golf and camaraderie.  Long may it continue.

This will be the first place to come if you want to know anything about your Society.  If you have any news, pictures or information you would like to share with the rest of the Society, please send it to oags.website@googlemail.com 

Any Old Alleynians of any ability are most welcome to join the Society.  Please contact the Hon. Secretary.

As the Captain reported in his newsletter, the turnout at our meetings continue to disappoint.  Some have requested to change the format, eg 18 holes + lunch.   Some of our older members find 36 holes too much with lunch and many of the younger members find circa £100 plus a day out of the office difficult in today’s business climate.   There are also mixed feelings about changing the venues, which are both highly rated.  The Society is also considering whether guests could be invited to the Autumn and Spring meetings to improve numbers.  Your Committee would appreciate your views.  Please forward your thoughts to the Captain at rogerwalker@raglan4.fsnet.co.uk. 

The Captain reported that a year ago that the society had a number of unpaid subscriptions, amounting to almost £1000.   The Committee took the decision last year to introduce an annual subscription.  This was endorsed at the AGM in September 2006.
  
The annual sub of £20 is necessary if the Society is to survive.   Some have paid, some haven't.  Please remember a strong Society has to be funded.