Headington A remain on course to repeat last year’s double after squeezing past Carterton 66-63 in the Oxford & District League Cup semi-finals at South Oxford.

With the league title already in the bag, they will now face Oxford City & County A in the final of the League Cup, sponsored by S&J Timms Cleaning Services and Frances Baker of Rub-A-Dub-Dub laundrette, under the floodlights at Hanborough next Thursday.

After Carterton pushed Headington all the way in the race for the league title, the semi-final clash between the sides was always likely to be a nail-biting affair.

Headington started the stronger, opening up a 14-shot lead at halfway.

But a solid second half from Carterton, led by Baden Sparkes, brought the game to a very tense finale.

With three of the four rinks finished and Carterton trailing by two shots on the game, Robbie Clanfield’s four needed a big finish on the final end to pull the match out of the fire.

But, having killed the end twice and with the evening getting darker, Carterton were unable to secure the shots needed, leaving Headington’s rink of John Nicholls, Steve Hainge, Jason King, and Craig Nicoll to seal victory with a 21-15 success.

In the other semi-final, Oxford City & County A swept aside Division 2 side West Witney 89-40.

With West Witney missing two of their regular back-end bowlers, the dominant Oxford side quickly built up a good lead, before pulling further away in the closing stages to triumph by 49 shots.

SEMI-FINAL RESULTS

Headington A 66, Carterton 63 (Headington skips first): I Snowdon 19, A Prew 16; N Rae-Welsh 13, B Sparkes 20; M Charlett 13, G Walker 12; C Nicoll 21, R Clanfield 15.

West Witney 40, Oxford City & County A 89 (West Witney skips first): G Coombs 12, C Earl 26; A Mac 12, M Petersen 15; M Hitchcox 7, P Comley 24; T Prew 9, A Ley 24.