SWINDON fencers Charlie Robbins, Ed Scott-Payne and Ben Simmonds all emerged from the Boys’ U14 Southern Region Fencing Championships as qualifiers for the British Youth Championships to be held later this year at the English National Institute of Sport in Sheffield.

Hosted at Bradfield College, the trio - Robbins and Scott-Payne both attend Prior Park Prep school of which Simmonds is a former pupil - booked their places from a field of 36 competitors.

After dominating their pools in the seeding rounds, they finished as the number one, two and three seeds for the knockout stages respectively.

Seeded first, Robbins didn’t drop a point in his pool and won his first two direct eliminations 10-1 and 10-4.

A tougher semi finals saw him come out as a well-deserved 15-11 victor.

At the other end of the draw, Scott-Payne and Simmonds similarly went through their direct elimination rounds cleanly - winning 15-0, 15-7, 11-1, 15-8 respectively - before facing each other in the semi-final.

In an enthralling contest with hits going each way, Simmonds emerged victorious 13-10 at the end of the nine-minute bout.

The all-Swindon final was tighter than the scoreline suggested with Robbins varying his attacks and showing defensive tenacity shining through.

Coach Neil Bromley said “This was another impressive performance from this group of Prior Park and Swindon fencers.

“They all absolutely deserve to be at the nationals, and on a different day the final order could have been different but the top three fencers in their age group in the region made it through.

“I am looking forward to seeing how they do at the nationals."