Kinnaird Cup 2026

09/03/26: The main weekend of the 2026 Kinnaird Cup in association with Advanta Wealth took place at Eton at the weekend, with no major shocks but plenty of fantastic Fives.

27 pairs entered this year's main competition, with the usual mixture of the top pairs and those eager to have a crack at them or try to get their hands on the Pepperpot Plate trophy. Most of the first round games were fairly straightforward, even with the top five seeded pairs getting a bye into Round Two. Lewis Drummond & Emily Scoones got off to a flying start and a 7-1 lead in the first game against Tom Cox & Rex Worth before the Salopian pair found their feet and turned things around; Olavian school pair Henry Etherington & Oscar Rushton put in a solid performance against Charlie Nicholls & Sahil Shah, while ex-Oxford pair Edwin Gosnell & Jonah Poulard took a game off Howard Wiseman & Olavian schoolboy Yifan Luo but were unable to find a way past them in the third and fourth. The other closest match in the round pitched 2025 U16 Schools champions Daniel Ingram & Charlie Dinmore against 1993 Schools Open champions Sid Simmons & Chris Austin. The youngsters took the first game but were 6-10 down in the second. When they came back to win that one 14-11 the writing was on the wall for the Wulfunian pair and they headed into the Pepperpot alongside the other ten defeated pairs.

An initial sorting out round to turn 11 pairs into eight created a Carthusian-heavy Plate B, with OCs Hugh Hutchinson & Max Dyer, school pair Jan Michalski & Jules Formige and coach/pupil combo Tom Leach & Bertie Marshall-Rice fighting it out for local pride, victory going to Jan & Jules.

The other eight headed into the best of three game quarter-finals, Henry & Oscar making short work of Bath University pair Alex Sapozhenko & Henry Barton-Smith, Chris & Sid returning to winning ways against Brigands Matt Davis & Alex Knight, Edwin & Jonah unable to recover from the morning's disappointment against Lewis & Emily and Ipswichians Henry Gardner & Alex Phillips (Pepperpot winner in 2024) falling victim to the wily Newbury pair Will Thomas & Paul Holland. Having already succumbed to last year's U16 winners, Chris & Sid now found themselves up against the runners-up from that competition as they took on Henry & Oscar. At first it looked as though the older pair had run out of steam as they lost the first game to 2; they rallied, however, and had chances to take the second game before finally bowing out 15-12. The other semi-final was a long, tight battle, only two games and both won 12-8 but taking an awfully long time to finish. In the end Lewis & Emily had a bit too much firepower for Will & Paul, setting up an intriguing final, with Emily looking to become the first ever female winner of the Pepperpot Trophy. The initial signs looked good, with Lewis & Emily getting off to another of their trademark rapid starts, cutting well and not letting their Olavian opponents into the first game, which was won 12-5. Things swung completely the other way in game two, however, as Henry & Oscar began to get to grips with the set piece, gradually taking control and never letting go once they had got in front. The next two games went their way 12-4, 12-4 to complete the victory.

Meanwhile, the big boys had all arrived and were getting ready for the afternoon Last 16 matches. All four of last year's semi-finalists were back again and all four looked in good form: Tom Dunbar & Seb Cooley gave the Ipswich schoolboys a lesson, Riki Houlden & Hugo Young cruised past Howard & Yifan, James Toop & Matt Wiseman kept Nicholls & Shah at arm's length and Sunil Tailor & Charles Plummer swiftly ended the hopes of Tom Gallagher & Harry Ravi. Fifth seeds Sam Welti & Ed Taylor were up against last year's schools champions Aadi Agarwal & Tanish Arjaria and also won in straight games, although they did have to hold off a strong third game challenge which saw the young Olavian pair get to 9. Sixth seeds Noah Caplin & Laurie Brock had a tricky-looking tie to navigate against U25 champions Isaac Weaver & Fred Prickett. They won the first game to 6 but found themselves behind in the second before crucially getting ahead just when it mattered to go 2-0 up and avoid getting involved in a longer battle. With Jack Pemberton injured and Prajeeth Sathiyamoorthy buried in medical exams, Ryan Perrie & Gwydion Wiseman teamed up and were up against Salopians Tom Cox & Rex Worth. This was a terrific match, with Ryan & Gwydion taking the first to 7 and then just able to hold off their opponents in the next two games, winning them 14-11 and 13-10. The final match of the round pitched the eighth seeds - Tom McCahon & Alex Abrahams - against the ninth ranked pair, Vishal Bhimjiyani & Hal Gibson-Leitao. This always looked like it would be a close one and so it proved. The match was marked from the start marked by significant momentum swings, Hal & Vishal starting strongly in the first and getting far enough ahead to withstand a bit of a comeback, but Tom & Alex taking that momentum into the second game, which they won to 4. When they also won the third to 8, they seemed to be in a strong position, but Vishal & Hal hit back, taking the fourth to 9 and establishing a 9-2 lead in the fifth. Just in time, however, Tom & Alex fought back once more, with Tom in particular finding his cut returning and volleying groove at just the right time as 2-9 became 11-9 in the space of a few hands before they closed the game out 12-10 to claim the last quarter-final place.

The Sunday Festival was a classic of its kind, with a splendid mixture of school pairs, university pairs, father & son pairs, club pairs, veterans (that means you Boughton & Stubbs) and relative novices playing with experienced partners. 17 pairs took part, with the group stages producing some incredibly close matches, with a remarkable number of 15-14, 15-13 and 15-12 scorelines. All of which meant that as the morning groups turned into the afternoon knockout stages, picking a winner in either the main competition or the plate felt like an impossible task.

When the morning dust had settled, the quarter-finals produced some intriguing match-ups. The evergreen Peter Boughton & Tony Stubbs found Ed Habershon & Ollie Avery a bit hot to handle, while Vatche Kassardjian and Westminster schoolboy Andrew Zhang continued their fine morning form with a comprehensive win over Bath University's Henry Barton-Smith & Charlotte Barr. Scratch Newbury/QEB pairing Jack Hopkins & Indrajit Datta - having topped their group thanks to a 15-13 and a 15-14 win - gave themselves slightly more margin for error with a 15-10 win over Old Cantabs Jamie Lai & Jessye Tu, while the semi-final line-up was completed by the old firm of Chris Lumbard & Ralph Morgan, who just held off the challenge of Old Ipswichian left-handers Sam Cook & Noah Urmston 15-13.

Having looked unstoppable for most of the day, Vatche & Andrew suddenly met their match in the semi-finals, falling 12-6, 12-5 to Ed & Ollie. The other semi-final saw Ralph & Chris run out of steam after winning the first game 12-10 against Jack & Indrajit, the Newbury/Barnet duo winning the second and third games comfortably. The final was a tremendous game, with the result in the balance right up until the last couple of rallies. Jack & Indrajit struck first, winning the first game to 7, but winning easily had not been their style at any stage of the day's proceedings and Ed & Ollie hit back to win the second to 5. Ed & Ollie continued their dominance into the early stages of the third, going 6-3 ahead before a six point hand from Jack & Indrajit turned the game on its head. It still wasn't straightforward for Jack & Indrajit, even from 9-6 up, but they managed to hold onto their lead and claim the win.

The other pairs were all battling away in the Plate competition, which was also run on a knockout basis, with an extra preliminary round inserted to accommodate nine pairs. In the semi-finals, Emily Scoones & Kristiana Smilovska saw off the Brigands/Westway father son duo of Stuart & Dylan Clarke and Lancing's Matt Davis & Henry Steele ended the run of Olavians Aadi Agarwal & Yuti Kumar, who has only started playing the game seriously this term at Oxford. This set up a fascinating final, Matt and his on court partner seeing off Emily and his off court partner 12-5.

Another talented Oxford novice, Ella Pal, was partnering Fred Prickett in Plate B and having seen off Mandie Barnes and Ipswich pupil Abbie Gammage, they couldn't quite find a way past Ipswich pair Betsy Laws & Millie Hogkinson, who are rapidly becoming Festival veterans themselves. Another Ipswich pupil, Anastasia Moore, was playing with Chris Austin and they saw off the Oxford/Berkhamsted combination of James Wheale & Anthony Adamson before also succumbing to the ruthless Betsy & Millie hitting machine in the final. James & Anthony then finished their day with a Plate C win over Mandie & Abbie, who were still busy reliving the glories of their morning group stage win over Jessye & Jamie.

Also back on court on Sunday afternoon were the main competition quarter-finalists, with the top eight seeds all having made it through to the last eight. Could any of the lower seeds cause an upset or were we heading to a repeat of last year's semi-finals? Quarter-final defeats are not really in the Tom Dunbar & Seb Cooley Fives vocabulary and they duly dispatched Tom McCahon & Alex Abrahams fairly quickly, although Tom & Alex did manage to get the second game to 5-5 before it ran away from them. Defending champions Riki Houlden & Hugo Young had to work a little harder to see off Ryan Perrie & Gwydion Wiseman, but the result was never really in doubt, despite a strong third game performance from the seventh seeds, Riki & Hugo completing the second leg of a potential Wiseman hat-trick in successive rounds if they want to make another final. James Toop & Matt Wiseman made their first Kinnaird quarter-final back in 1998 and their standards have barely dropped since; they again looked in fine fettle as they defeated Noah Caplin & Laurie Brock 2, 5 and 4. The fourth quarter-final saw fourth seeds Sunil Tailor & Charles Plummer take on fifth seeds Ed Taylor & Sam Welti. These two pairs had met in the league during the week and it had gone to five games so perhaps it wasn't a surprise that this one did so too. More surprising perhaps was that not many of the five games were especially close, Plummer & Tailor winning the first, third and fifth to 1, 3 and 6 respectively, while Taylor & Welti twice kept themselves in the match with 12-8 wins in the second and fourth.

The end result is that we have the same two semi-finals as last year and these will be played at Eton on Sunday 22nd March at 2:30pm alongside the two Ladies Championships semi-finals.