Former Handicap champion Nicola Coles staged an astonishing comeback to defeat last year’s runner-up, Bill Mann, in this year’s competition, turning a 13-point deficit at the halfway point into a stunning victory.

Starting with a six-point advantage, Bill immediately turned it into eight, and after eight ends was 16-3 ahead.

But after taking the ninth, Nicola moved the mat up, securing a four on the next and conceding only one more point in the entire match, finally triumphing 22-17.

Drawn-pairs partners Mark Gooch and yours truly also met in the Handicap, where I managed to claw back Mark’s eight-point starting advantage to progress 21-17.

In the quarter-final, I’m due to meet Clive Thomas for the third time this season – having already played him in the John Martin Shield and Drawn Pairs.

Clive reached that stage courtesy of an impressive 21-11 win over Peter Huntley, where he started with an advantage of just two points.

And he also progressed in the Men’s Championship, beating Stephen Banks 22-12.

Elsie out

Elsie Wilding, the reigning Women’s Champion, who entered only pairs competitions this year, has been knocked out of both in the first round.

She and Bob Sutton lost to Wendy Alexander and John Box in the Mixed.

Then, with Wendy as her partner this time, they lost by a single shot in the Drawn Pairs, to Dorothy Glasby – and John again – 16-17.

Dorothy and Basil Larkins, who won the Mixed Pairs in 2021 and were runners-up the following year, are through to the second round, too, after defeating Jill Hatfield and David Leach.

Bill, with partner Andrew Croft, progressed to the next round of the Drawn Pairs with a 16-13 victory over Stephen Banks and Rowland Morris. It means another encounter between Bill and Nicola, who, with partner Maurice Benson, will be their opponents in the quarter-finals.

Tony, too

Bob Sutton has a new partner in the competition after Tony Jarvis, who has been beset by injury all season, withdrew. The organisers have replaced Tony with Paul Palmer, and the new pairing will face Anne Bosman and Mark Howell for the opportunity to play Mark and me in the quarter-finals.

Tony has also withdrawn from the Men’s Championship, where he was due to face Tony Ashby, who now receives a bye to the quarter-finals and faces Bob, who featured in one of the most thrilling matches of this round of games.

He was pipped by Marge Breading on the deciding end in the John Martin Shield after both players had staged comebacks.

The scores were level at 20-all when a measure was required on the final end, resulting in the narrowest of victories for Marge.

Anne Bosman, Gwen Croft and Judy Aldis are all through to the next round of the Veterans’ competition, beating Graham Aldis, Tony Ashby and Maurice Benson respectively.

All submitted results are on the website, under the heading Club Matches 2025.