There was a strong Irish, English, Italian and French feel to the opening of a new sports club in Letchworth Garden City. The Cuckoos Pétanque Club held their inaugural day at their new venue of the North Herts Irish Association in Letchworth GC on St Geo

There was a strong Irish, English, Italian and French feel to the opening of a new sports club in Letchworth Garden City.

The Cuckoos Pétanque Club held their inaugural day at their new venue of the North Herts Irish Association in Letchworth GC on St George's Day.

The Cuckoos previously played at the Bird in Hand at Gosmore.

The day started with a presentation of the National Lottery funded Awards 4 All certificate to the captain of the club, Italian Paolo Infantino, by the chairman of the Irish club, Pat Geoghegan.

Awards 4 All had given a £5,000 grant to the club to enable them to build a piste at the association. Work started in early December and was completed early last month.

Further money was provided by Rory O'Brien to enable the Cuckoos to build a stand which is now named after him.

This new piste will benefit all the players of the Chiltern region as it will host two regional tournaments this month and in June.

There were 18 teams entered for the inaugural day competition. The format was mixed triples, so there were 54 players in total.

The winners were Triple Espresso (Paolo Infantino, Sue Infantino and Peter Taylor).

Runners-up were Bancroft, Milton Keynes (Adam Sullivan, Jen Light and Ken Light), with Bouledrome in third (Peter Ward, Monica Ward and Rob Munday) and Plume A in fourth (Lorraine Downs, Chris Jones and Andy Goodship).

The Wooden Spoon went to RAC (Rory O'Brien, Alan Griffiths and Chris Wilson).

The North Herts Irish Pétanque Club will also become home to the Clovers team, formerly the Plume of Feathers at Little Wymondley.

A 'come and try' event was also held on Saturday to encourage any new players in the area to form new teams for the sport which is most commonly played in France.