It has been a very successful couple of weeks for Woolhope SMBC as their players have secured a place in the national finals and two County titles. John Mills secured the place to represent Herefordshire in the Nationals in April by winning a very close final against his Woolhope club-mate Charlie Cox in the singles national qualifier.

Last weekend was the Triples tournament and a first for Herefordshire – 3 generations of the same family competing together to win a county title with 11 year old Dominic Rogers playing alongside Dad Anthony and Granddad Phil to take the title in yet another all Woolhope final against John Mills and Becci & Charlie Cox. Not satisfied with that, Dominic, Phil & Anthony came back with Pam Park on the following day to take the Fours title, defeating a Weston-under-Penyard SMBC team of Betty & Harold Aubrey and Gill & Tim Rigden in the final. 124 competitors took part over the weekend and special mention must go to George Marshall of Ross BC who on each day played in a team in the same qualifying group as the Woolhope team, beating them each time to go forward as group winners only to lose in the knockout stages and see Woolhope, having qualified from the group as runners-up, go on to win the tournament.

In January Herefordshire played host to the England Under-21 short mat bowls squad in a friendly fixture which saw the England juniors run out 28-12 victors after a very enjoyable day's bowling. Four young Herefordshire bowlers are in the England squad and all played on the day. The England manager, Brian Claessen, paid tribute to the Herefordshire hosts, particularly captain Becci Cox and June Pearce and her team at the Larruperz Centre, for organising a day which ran so smoothly and to Brab Hallowes, of Devon and Herefordshire's Richard Bemand, who umpired the match.

Also in January, the County A team bowed out of the inter-county championship with a 24-16 defeat in their knockout tie with Dorset. The Premier team travel to Bristol for a quarter final tie against Surrey this weekend.

For more stories in full please see this week's Ross Gazette.