After finishing rock bottom last season, Richard Brown's side were narrowly beaten 6.5-5.5 by Leicestershire in their opening fixture at Cherwell Edge last weekend.

Trailing 2.5 to 1.5 after the morning foursomes, the Northants lads managed to match their hosts two apiece in the singles, but it was not enough to avoid finishing on the wrong end of the result.

However Peterborough Milton's Aide Firman - making a welcome return to the county scene after two seasons away - has backed his team mates to be right in the mix for the trophy after the disappointment of the last campaign.

Firman said: "It was great to be back and I have to say the team spirit is excellent so hopefully we can do better than last year.

"I did okay considering I have not played county golf for so long, winning my singles and the foursomes with my partner Simon Williams. But we were unlucky to lose in the last singles match.

"After coming bottom of the league last season I am convinced we can really compete this time round and we are all looking forward to our next match with Norfolk where we can hopefully get some points on the board."

Firman and his team mates will be in action again this weekend for the prestigious Eastern Counties Foursomes held at Seacroft in Skegness - an event won last year by Cambridgeshire.


TOFT Hotel's bid to win Division Three of the South Lincolnshire Golf League has got off to a flying start.
After a convincing victory at home against Boston West in their opening fixture, the hotel hitters produced another solid performance on the Fenland course at Tydd St Giles to record a 3.5 - 2.5 win.
Despite playing on a wide open track featuring some truly enormous greens which left more than the odd 50-foot putt, Toft's first pair of Robert Creasey and Scott Hand got off to an excellent start with a 5 and 3 win.
And building on that start, Will Ash and Drew Farrell held off a strong fightback from the home pairing to bring home the win with a hole to spare for a two-match lead.
Toft's next pair of Graham Bellis and Mick Bates then picked up a decent half after letting slip a three hole lead before Stuart Parker and junior member David Magill found themselves narrowly edged out by the odd hole.
Another junior making his debut, Nick Garland, and his partner Harry Wild also lost out 2 and 1 leaving the result of the match in the hands of the final pairing of Allan Smith and Les Lawrence.
But the experienced duo held their nerve and used their knowledge of the course to record a convincing 4 and 2 win to clinch the match and leave Toft sitting pretty in the league.

AND there was good news for Toft Hotel in the first round of the Bramley Trophy - the all-Lincolnshire scratch knock-out series.
All three matches were close but Toft overcame a strong Boston team by two to one to march on into the next round.
James Dair led off with a 3 and 2 victory but Adam Freear - featuring in his first ever Bramley Trophy match - went down 2 and one to leave the match all square.
It was then up to Andy Rogers to pick up the last match by taking two of the last three holes finishing 1 up for the tightest of winning margins.
Toft will be hoping to build on their success of last September when the team finished third in the finals at Seacroft near Skegness.

FOR a small club Thorney Lakes certainly has a big heart.
Last weekend members held their annual charity day for MacMillan Cancer Support and 144 golfers turned out to get involved.
The event was organised by members Dave Wishart and Ron Needham and raised a whopping £2,700 for the cause.
Chris Waller won the overall competition and Ruth Rickett took the ladies honours.

PETERBOROUGH Milton hosted the annual Northamptonshire PGA Cantrell Cup tournament last weekend.
The event was played over 36 holes with an opening round of pro-am foursomes followed by a four ball betterball session.
And while host club assistant Matt Thorpe and his partner Neil Presto finished two under par 140 with cards of 72 and 68, Cold Ashby pair Shane Rose and amateur partner Greg Croxton walked off with the spoils after a five under 66 in their second round.