Headington's Craig Nicoll and Witney’s Chris Miles make their Middleton Cup debuts in Oxfordshire’s Group 3B opener against Hampshire at Atherley on Saturday.

Nicoll will bowl at No 3 in skip Howard Watts’s rink, while Miles comes in as lead for Alan Prew’s four.

Manager Calvin Carpenter is looking for Oxon to step up on last year’s showing when the county won their first two matches, but then lost their final two games. He said: “Last year we proved we have the players to compete within this group with wins against Hampshire and Surrey, which led us to topping the group at the mid-point.

“This year we hope to put ourselves in a similar position as last year by recording wins against the same two opponents in the opening games and then to put up stronger performances against Middlesex and Berkshire than we did last year.”

Oxfordshire: J Philipott, B Lambourne, R Redford, Gr Moon; AJ Docherty, J King, M Charlett, M Sykes; L Young, N Lewis, C Nicoll, H Watts, C Miles, P Sharman, S Richens, A Prew; M Petersen, Ge Moon, Ro Clanfield, B Sparkes; K Holloway, I Henwood, N Rae-Welsh, I Snowdon.

Meanwhile, Oxfordshire made a disappointing start to their Home Counties League campaign with a 120-100 defeat by Surrey at Shirley Park.

Oxon lost on five of the six rinks with only Richard Redford’s four of Steve Gibson, Ian Whelpton and Alan Ley preventing a whitewash with a 22-22 draw against skip Dennis Hennessy.

The visitors battled hard on the five other rinks, but came off second best on each occasiion.

Nick Rae Welsh’s side of Mike Petersen, George Schwab and Kevin Alder led by five shots after 15 ends against Graham Vigor, but then collapsed to lose 21-18.

Chris Earl’s four of AJ Docherty, Steve Gilkes and David Clanfield were pipped 17-15 by Lee Dickson’s rink.

Mark Charlett’s quartet of Paul McGrath, Dean May and Jason King also suffered a narrow defeat, 17-14 against Mike Sigamoney.

But Stuart Richens’ and Calvin Carpenter’s rinks were always trailing as they went down 21-14 and 22-17 respectively.

Surrey 120 (21pts), Oxfordshire 100 (1) (Surrey rinks first) Rink 1: R Corne, S Jellis, M McDonagh, L Dickson 17; AJ Docherty, S Gilkes, D Clanfield, C Earl 15.

Rink 2: N Asten, P Bennett, T Orr, D Hennessy 22; S Gibson, I Whelpton, A Ley, R Redford 22.

Rink 3: C Jones, S Spencer, P Vamvacopolous, G Vigor 21; M Petersen, G Schwab, K Alder, N Rae-Welsh 18.

Rink 4: C Boozer, R Cushen, J Cable, M Sigamoney 17; P McGrath, D May, J King, M Charlett 14.

Rink 5: M O’Leary, P Chuter, P Coleman, I Honnor 21; J Philpott, R Barnett, Re Clanfield, S Richens 14.

Rink 6: A Barclay, N Beeson, S Shanley, E O’Flynn 22; C Miles, G May, C Nicoll, C Carpenter 17.