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Oxfordshire Men's Triples Champions
- Henley Bowling Club
- 2 days ago
- 2 min read
This 2025 season, Kevin Currill, Simon Hatcher and Dave Wilson entered the County & National Men's Triples Competition. The Henley Bowling Club hasn't taken part in County matches for quite some time, primarily because being in the south of Oxfordshire, most matches are too far away for the majority of our members.
The luck of the draw for the Men's Triples was with the Henley team and they had a bye in their 1st round match and the 2nd and 3rd round games were both at home. The 2nd round match was against the defending champions on 30th May, a triple from Carterton Bowls Club. There was a good crowd of onlookers and Henley won in an exciting finish by scoring a 4 on the last end to beat the opposition by 1 shot.
On Monday 2nd June, their 3rd round match was against a team from South Oxford Bowls Club. Henley were slow to start but soon took the lead and they say they didn't feel threatened despite it being fairly close at times.
Just a few days later on 6th June, Henley had to travel to Banbury Borough Bowling Club for their quarter final game against another team from Carterton.
Again Henley had a slow start and were not helped by dropping an 8 on the third end. Halfway through the match, Henley had closed the gap to 10-15 and then an end later, 14-15. However, Carterton increased their lead to 14-20 and were lying 3 shots on the sixteenth end until skip Dave Wilson turned the end around to score with 5 shots making it 19-20. A strong finish by Henley saw them finish with a score of 28-20 to make the semi-final on Saturday 12th July at Chipping Norton Bowls Club.
The semi-final was against a team from Banbury Central and was played in seriously hot conditions on a green which Simon described as the fastest he'd ever played on, like an indoor rink. Although after four ends Henley were level at 4 all, by the thirteenth end they were 21-8 down. Henley then produced a brilliant fight back and won every end after that with a 4, 6, 1, 1 and a 1 to tie the game at 21-21 after 18 ends. In the extra end, Henley won by 3 shots to reach the final.
The County final was played on the afternoon of 27th July at Banbury Chestnuts Bowls Club against a team from Addebury Bowls Club. Another slow start saw Henley being 0-5 down before all three players raised their game. Only 6-8 down by the ninth end but in the lead 14-11 by the fifteenth. With singles shots scored on the next two ends, Henley went into the final end 16-11 up and saw the game out to win 16-13.
As County finalists, the team now go on to play in the National finals in Leamington Spa representing Oxfordshire with their first round match on Saturday 23rd August against a team representing Hampshire.