The Leys, with several national swimmers in its team, were among the strongest opponents Oundle would face this year. However, Oundle approached the recent Gala with determination, and the senior boys won their age group, which is a remarkable achievement.
Finn Clarkson (Sc) gave his all throughout, and competed in many events with technical grace; George Robertson (F) was also notable for competing in both age groups.
Ryan Ho (C) stunned the crowds with his spectacular display of a technically perfect breaststroke, achieving a record time of 35 seconds. A massive 32 PBs were broken.
Eleanor Macintosh (K) supported with verve, and also excelled in the front crawl. Carla Cox's (W) swimming debut was equally as impressive as was Maddy Farley's (L) win in the butterfly; Carla does not do swimming as her sport, and her efforts were noted. Although they did not win, Oundle can be proud with the manner in which they competed. Despite the loss, swimmers managed to break two records and 33 personal bests were achieved.
The Squash Club played away at Uppingham. The 1st V were at a disadvantage before the matches even started due to two of the players being injured. Harry Daniels (G) and Sam Boscawen (B) were put to the test filling positions 4 and 5, but they lost their matches 0-3. Jack Murphy (B) made a gritty comeback while entertaining the crowd with some outrageous trick shots and won his match 3-2. Alex Swanston (G) and Dylan Martens (L) both won their matches in convincing fashion, 3-0 each.
On unfamiliar courts, a foreign scoring system and with two players down, the 1st V won against the odds, 3-2.
The 2nd V did not get as much joy as the 1st V, losing 1-4. However, Alec Bruce-Gardyne (Ldr) managed to overcome his opponent in a five game thriller, ending 3-2.
Outside of School, at the East Midlands Regionals championship at Leicester, Dylan Martens (L) finished 3rd in the tournament. Competition included some of England's top U19 players, including the number 1, who placed first.
Oundle's mixed first and second badminton teams produced their best performance of the season against Oakham, winning 14:4 and 13:5.
Oundle's squad cooperated well and applied varying strategies to give their opponents many unpredictable shots. There were many strong and accurate smashes from Francis Yiu (Sc) and Teck C Cheah (Ldr, while Sophie Crowe (K) also showed a high standard of consistency in her double and mixed games.
In the 2nds, James Clayton (L) hit a variety of shots to different positions, giving his opponent an intense match. Tilly Cooper (D) showed outstanding performance in all her games as well. Ben and Chris Bird (L) worked extremely well as a pair, only making very few mistakes.
Oundle 1st XI team travelled the short journey to play Stamford School. It was a Stamford push back so Oundle began strong, aggressively and quickly, soon obtaining the ball from the opposition and pushing it high. Immediately Oundle had shots at goal from our forwards but unfortunately for us their goalie made some quality saves preventing the team from scoring an early goal. Short corners did occur, yet Oundle continuously failed to score. Oundle kept possession for the first 25 minutes, constantly trying to penetrate their defence towards our high forwards and finally the ball was given to Anna Hodgkinson (N) by Frannie Aldridge (K) where Anna skilled passed their goalie and dribbled the ball over the line. This gave Oundle a cushion and from this began to play brightly with Lucie Baker (L) pulling the strings at set-piece before half time.
In the second half, Lily Craven (Sn) and Polly Baker (L) delivered the ball consistently well to Hebe Hughes (K) on the right wing for her to use her pace in order to give the ball to the forwards in the D. Hebe sprinted down the wing and pushed to ball to Dora Nicolle (W) who managed to nutmeg the keeper, making the score 2-0.
Oundle continued to dominate the rest of the fixture, with the Stamford keeper proving a tough nut to crack. The side looks in shape for the end of season run in.
Doug Russell (Ldr)