Jack Williams is 19 and works in a camping and outdoor store in regional Victoria. He is, perhaps, Australia's most unassuming national champion.

Jenny Clarke teaches biomechanics and applied exercise science at Canterbury University in Christchurch, New Zealand, and is a world champion in her sport.

Retired barrister and banker Stephen Mulliner lives in Britain with his wife, Sarah – they've been married 37 years – and is also a world champion.

All three will meet in Melbourne this weekend when the Golf Croquet World Championships are contested in Australia for the first time.

Croquet is more popular than you might think. The Melbourne play-offs are expected to attract 80 players from 14 countries. According to Mulliner, secretary-general of the World Croquet Federation, there are some 25,000 active players and 29 member states in the federation including Georgia, Japan and Russia.

England, Australia, the United States and New Zealand are the top four playing nations, but Egypt is a worthy fifth and Spain is looking increasingly sharp with a mallet.

In Australia there are more than 9000 registered players and 265 clubs; some have introduced barefoot and night games to appeal to new players.

"Some of the most successful players are only young – like Jack Williams, who won both the Australian Under 21 golf croquet singles title and the Victorian open golf singles last year," says Croquet Victoria president Jim Clement.

If you thought croquet was a genteel pastime of old ladies, you'll be interested to hear the Egyptian players, the most feared in the world, hit the balls so hard that special fencing has been erected at all Victorian championship venues.

"They have such class and hit the ball ferociously hard," says Williams. "And they are extremely accurate from everywhere. Whether going for a hoop, clearing another ball away or lining up another hoop. They are quality players. Very quality."

It's important to note the world championships are for golf croquet, not association croquet. The difference is easy to explain through the magic of simile: association croquet is Test cricket, golf is Twenty20. The former can trace its roots to 11th-century France; the latter emerged as a popular garden-party game in the late 19th century.

"Association croquet is the longer, more complex version of the game, where players will still be learning new tactics after several years," explains Clarke, the top-ranked woman in association croquet and second in golf croquet. "Golf croquet is the faster version. A game takes about 40 minutes and it is more interactive. Players take turns taking shots, with both competing to win the same hoop."

Clarke and Mulliner were introduced to the sport while studying at Oxford and Cambridge, respectively. Williams, who scored a wildcard to the world championships, started playing in year 7 when his grandmother took him to her club at Traralgon, in Victoria's Latrobe Valley. While at school he "used to get picked on a bit" for playing, but now his friends think it's cool – especially now he's the national under-21 champion.

Also playing this weekend is Australia's highest-ranked player, Greg Fletcher from Adelaide, and mother and son competitors Charlie and Anne Sharpe from Sydney, who will face off against each other in a first for the world championships.

Williams' ambition is to make it through to the final 16, the fast and furious knockout round. "Anything above that and I will feel extremely happy," he says.

And what would he say to encourage other young Australians to take up croquet? "I guess the most exciting thing is that in a few years you could be playing for Australia," he says. "Just because there's not many people doing it, so there's more scope to get to the top of the game."

Croquet and the meaning life

We asked Stephen Mulliner, the world's top association croquet player, what the game has taught him about life. This is his reply:

"The main lesson is that how we react to adversity, whether in sport or in life, is a personal decision. We are not compelled to be upset by things that go wrong. We can instead adopt an approach to accidents, misfortunes and losses of briefly checking whether there is a lesson to be learnt and then consigning what happened to the dustbin of history. If there is a learning point, write it down. Otherwise you are bound to forget it.

"It is also important to constantly boost your self-image as a confident, effective performer by writing down all your good things and great shots as they occur. Write them down in a journal and re-read the journal constantly. Flood your subconscious with your positive achievements, not your mishaps.

"This approach applies to life as well as to sport. Winning the Association Croquet World Championship in Florida in April 2016 was the pinnacle of my competitive career (so far!) and my mental approach was undoubtedly the main reason why I was able to grasp the opportunity presented to me by a combination of good play and good luck.

"My most treasured memory of 2016, however, is a truly outrageous, sharply-angled three-yard jump shot I pulled off in the Inter-Counties Championship last May 9 (in Brighton, England). I shaped up for it, reminded myself that I was the very recent world champion and played an absolutely incredible shot.

"I can, and no doubt will, play plenty of poor shots, but that jump shot will remain with me forever."

NEED TO KNOW

The Golf Croquet World Championships run from February 25 to March 5 at venues in Melbourne, Geelong and Ballarat. For details, see croquetvic.asn.au