Latest news with #CulfordSchool
Yahoo
05-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
New antiques fair with 'high-quality' items coming to Suffolk this month
A new antiques and decorative fair is going to launch in Suffolk this month. The Lomax Antiques Fair is holding the brand-new event over the August bank holiday weekend at Culford School. Held within the grand and historic surroundings of the independent school, just outside Bury St Edmunds, the event promises a vibrant mix of fine antiques, decorative pieces, and vintage finds. A variety of items will be on offer at the fair (Image: Lomax Fairs) A spokesman for the event said: "The venue offers a stunning backdrop and ample opportunity for both seasoned collectors and first-time visitors to browse and buy. READ MORE: Where you can see the Red Arrows this month "Visitors can expect a diverse and high-quality selection of furniture, fine art, jewellery, ceramics, textiles, and quirky decorative treasures from some of the UK's most respected dealers." It's the first time the event has been held (Image: Lomax Fairs) There will be free parking and refreshments available, and visitors will have the chance to explore the grounds. Dog owners are being told that their four-legged friends are not allowed inside the school building. Earlier this year Culford School hosted the Rotary Classic Car Show, which was attended by thousands of people.
Irish Examiner
19-06-2025
- Sport
- Irish Examiner
Freeman looks to North for inspiration ahead of Lions' trip Down Under
Tommy Freeman was a 12-year-old kid still learning his rugby apprenticeship at the remote Culford School in Sussex when George North rampaged his way around Australia and etched his name into the padded pages of British and Irish Lions history. It started at Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane, in the first Test against the Wallabies, when the Welsh wing blitzed his way from the tourists' own 10m line, beat four players and wagged his finger at a flailing Will Genia before touching down. 'If I could do what he did it would be pretty good,' said Freeman who will join Scotland's Duhan van der Merwe and England counterpart Marcus Smith in an exciting Lions back three against Argentina in Dublin on Friday night. North didn't stop there in 2013. A week later and he was picking Israel Folau up and carrying him like a dumper truck would a pile of sand while ploughing ahead with the ball. Seven days later and he scored again as the Lions sealed a 2-1 series victory. Of all the players Freeman could have chosen when asked for his formative Lions memories, none seem so relevant given North, like Freeman now, was a Northampton Saints player at the time and a guy who could put in a hell of a shift at centre if required. 'For him it was similar to me with the size. I don't think he was looked at as a centre, it was 'if he could have a go and try it', and he happened to be pretty handy there. There are probably similar aspects to our games and when he was flying he was pretty unstoppable and pretty awesome to watch. 'There are definitely bits of the game but he could back it up as well. The game has changed massively. You have got the out and out wingers who stay out on their wings and run pretty fast and chase pretty hard whereas now it is just a centre playing on the wing these days, I would say.' Chris Boyd, the former Saints director of rugby who worked with Munster as a consultant last season, once said that Freeman could operate anywhere along a back line apart from No.10. He's clearly a handy man to have around right now. The player himself has spoken about the advantages that come with being able to slot into different roles and how this allows him to be a better teammate for those around him. Impress your peers, Andy Farrell has said. He's well poised to do that. There are others who bring versatility to the table but, when it comes to the two wing positions, it is Freeman, van der Merwe and the Irish pair of Mack Hansen and James Lowe who will be jostling for the starts come the first Wallaby Test in Brisbane. The Irish pair has the benefit of so much face time with Farrell and so many of the Lions coaching staff, but Freeman has built up an eye-catching body of work with his club and with England where his poaching instincts are only part of the package. Pace, power, fancy feet, and height Still only 24, he boasts pace, power, fancy feet, and height. Some of his assists have been more spectacular than his tries and there is ample evidence of a relish for the defensive game in the form of some thundering and critical tackles. This is a player who has overcome adversity too. Diagnosed with epilepsy as a kid, he was rejected by Leicester Tigers aged 16 and before a growth spurt that took him to 6' 2'. Eddie Jones took him off at half-time in his last game with England. And it's less than two years since he failed to make the World Cup. Freeman's Dublin audition won't be hurt by the presence of eight other Englishman in the first XV, and the fact that he will be operating off a half-back axis of Alex Mitchell and Fin Smith that he knows so well from their experiences together at Franklin's Gardens. That sort of in-built understanding has the potential to paper over what are sure to be some cracks in the early stages of this Lions operation with Freeman serving notice of a commitment to play some heads-up rugby now and in the weeks to come. "The intention, he says plainly of the approach, is to score lots of tries. 'Instinctive playing. We're not going to be there to set stuff up and go through phases for the sake of going through phases. We went to score off the back of anything we can. 'The guys we've got in the backline, there are threats people have to offer and the ball players can put us in those spaces. It's going to be a lot of fun and dangerous.' Read More Farrell throws down the gauntlet as opportunity beckons for chosen Lions
Yahoo
21-05-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
‘Doubles is absolute carnage': meet Henry Patten, GB's unsung Wimbledon champion
It's slightly unusual to hear Henry Patten – along with Harri Heliövaara, the reigning men's doubles champion at Wimbledon and the Australian Open – call tennis a 'fun hobby'. But then you spend time in his company and realise he is slightly unusual. Patten, 29, was not supposed to be a professional, never mind a grand slam winner. Though he played county level as a child, he enjoyed various sports as a teenager before a tennis scholarship to Culford School in Suffolk – 'I don't know how we weaselled that!' – inspired him to attend college in North Carolina, where he read economics. Advertisement Related: Emma Raducanu sweeps past Daria Kasatkina to claim another win on clay 'We'd have two hours' training in the afternoon, a foreign concept to me,' he says. 'That was where I learned how to be a professional without really understanding what was happening, because I was having a good time.' Patten, a late developer missed at every level, evidences a flawed system. Though he acknowledges that 'it's pretty tough to see a hundred 12-year-olds and say which'll be a champion', even when he excelled in the US no one paid attention. 'I came home and the first professional event, someone from the LTA came up and said: 'Who are you?' I didn't know how to take that.' So he agreed to join Ernst & Young as a technology risk consultant, but was saved by the pandemic, doing well enough in bubble events for his family to insist he pursued tennis seriously. 'Thank goodness they talked me around otherwise I wouldn't be sitting here. A friend works at EY and he's absolutely miserable, whereas any time I'm upset or struggling, I can play tennis. It completely engrosses you and takes your mind off whatever else is going on.' Advertisement Patten's calm sense of perspective is striking, but a debut grand slam final is of a palpably different order – especially for an unseeded, unknown Briton in SW19. 'The first time we played Wimbledon I was trying to act like I wasn't nervous at all, and we lost very quickly, so now I let the nerves be there,' he says. 'But this time I couldn't stop smiling, it's the coolest thing ever. Walking down the corridor, past the trophies and underneath the Kipling quote, it feels like the absolute pinnacle of anything.' Emerging to a crowd, though, is different – 'You want that moment to last for ever, don't really want to start playing tennis' – and as the contest intensified into an unfathomable epic, the atmosphere became equally feverish. 'The whole way we were clinging on desperately,' Patten tells me, 'so I didn't feel much pressure until the last point, and Harri hit a great first serve – I didn't even touch the ball.' After which, mayhem. 'What was amazing was I had everyone in my box,' Patten says, 'and they all had the same face on that I had on … the craziest, best feeling ever, a home crowd going completely ballistic, everyone's just nuts. To create those emotions in people, it's an absolute honour.' In Melbourne, six months later, it was Patten tasked with settling another classic: 'I felt a lot more pressure thinking blindly, 'Serve it out, just serve it out.' I went completely blank so Harri came and said, 'Your serve is great, serve here; I'm going to go here,' which usually the server would dictate. I served an ace and said, 'OK, now tell me how to serve on this one.' Advertisement Before teaming up with Finland's Heliövaara, Patten partnered fellow Briton Julian Cash, eventually realising that he had to be ruthless to progress. 'One of those difficult conversations you just have to have, and we had it. What's unusual is we're still friends and we've got seven Brits in the doubles top 50, which is unbelievable – it's a golden age.' Doubles, though, suffers from a chronic lack of funding, coverage and care, despite proof – exemplified by Patten's experiences – that people love it. 'It's a team sport, so you've got different tactics,' he explains when asked to pitch it. 'You see a lot more variation in the shots – singles is mainly baseline rallies, but doubles has net play with quick hands, it's absolute carnage. 'Singles, you have a pretty strong idea of who's going to win, whereas doubles, everything's out of the window … I know friends of years who split up and hate each other. Fundamentally, you're dealing with extremely competitive 30-year-old men who travel the world together – it's a recipe for disaster!' Patten also has a vision for change, citing padel as an example. 'There's always a good energy. Most sports, the spectacle is great but it's really about being with friends and having a nice time, so you could turn doubles into something different, with music and free crowd movement. Doubles has a great chance of becoming this unique, fun event … if the authorities let it.'
