The original croquet game called Association Croquet began in England, France and Ireland well before 1900 and was played mainly on the private lawns of country homes for recreation. Association Croquet was also the sole or primary game played at clubs in Australia until the1980s. Golf Croquet was played occasionally as a social game at some clubs until then but has become increasingly popular since. It's now played regularly at most clubs and there are many golf croquet  tournaments strongly contested at all levels throughout the year. Other more recent forms of croquet are Ricochet, Gateball and Aussie Croquet.

Association Croquet remains popular and is considered by many to be the more challenging game, sometimes likened to billiards but on grass, due to techniques of calculating angle, strength, spin and other skills in hitting the ‘striker’ ball to place balls in favourable position to make a ‘break’, i.e. scoring a series of hoops in order, and to make the task of an opponent to do so more difficult.

Golf Croquet is a faster and shorter game where the aim is also to score hoops but all players (2 or 4) in a game remain on court, taking turns to hit their designated ball to be the first to score the next hoop in turn and thus prevent the opposition from doing so, including by hitting opposition ball/s to unfavourable positions. Many players find their skills are applicable to both Association and Golf Croquet but enjoy the differing challenges and character of the two games, while other players favour one or the other game.

Gateball is a relatively new mallet game that has become very popular in  Japan, Korea and now China. A fast team game played on a compact court with smaller, lighter mallets and balls than those used in traditional croquet, gateball is increasing in popularity in Australia. It is currently offered in this region at Epping and Strathfield Croquet Clubs but is not currently offered at Eastwood.. 

Ricochet  has some features in common with Association Croquet. It is currently not in the regular play schedule at Eastwood but may be played at other times by those interested.