The Mason Arms, Thrapston, Northamptonshire

I'm sure I've mentioned it before, but Table Skittles as a pub and club game has fallen off a cliff in the part of Leicestershire/Northamptonshire where I reside. From a position just 10 years ago where there would have been maybe 20 venues for the game within a 15 minute drive, now there's perhaps half a dozen, not all of which are in regular competitive use.

Of course it's been a long time since the game was anything like 'ubiquitous' in the area, and the game was already in steady decline as we moved into the 21st century, but the disruption to pub-going during the recent lockdowns has put the nail in the coffin for a great many skittles pubs and clubs, and consequently many of the leagues where the game is played competitively are struggling to remain sustainable.

Not all is lost though. Skittles Tables can still be found all over this part of the East Midlands, and leagues still operate if you know where to look for them, which is of course a major part of the problem. Northamptonshire Table Skittles has rarely seen much in the way of promotion by its players, and in common with a great many of our traditional pub games, those who play Skittles often regard it as just one of many, largely 'unremarkable' reasons why they go to the pub, and certainly see no reason to shout about it. It's probably time someone did shout about it though, lest the game disappear completely from pubs and clubs within our lifetime.

For myself, it's become something of a renewed pleasure, when on the increasingly rare occasions I stumble upon an old Skittles Table that I wasn't previously aware of, as I did in a market town in North Northamptonshire quite recently.

I'm a reasonably regular visitor to the attractive market town of Thrapston. Conveniently close to us, and with a particularly good Butchers, and a smart Brewery Tap for modern hop-forward beers of a hefty strength, which is where you'll usually find me. There are also four pubs with a slightly more old-fangled offering, only one of which I've had the pleasure of visiting in recent years, which is remiss of me I know...

Particularly given that Thrapston lies cheek by jowl with the village of Islip, itself now a pub-free village but significantly the birthplace of the eponymous Islip & District Skittles League. I knew that the league was still going in one form or another from a visit to The Domino pub in Corby, where a Ladies League match was in progress. Very much an outlier of the league then, but I think that represents the dearth of Skittles play in and around Corby as much as anything, The Domino being a fairly recent and very welcome convert to Northamptonshire's traditional pub game.

The Islip & District League is a much tighter affair. As can be seen on the fixture list above, the heart of the competition centres on the former Working Mens Club which fields no less than four teams. In fact this and the Rushden Four-a-Side Skittles League are run by long-serving Islip Club steward Terry Gunn.

Outside of the club there are now just three pubs with teams in the league. The aforementioned decline of the game in North Northamptonshire is clear to see, but highlighted all the more when contrasted with the same league fixture list from the 2010/11 season. This shows four teams from the Islip Club as it does now, but back then the league stretched to 24 teams playing across 3 divisions! Some of the pubs are sadly gone, and many more pubs and clubs shown no longer have a Skittles Table.

On the upside, Islip Club appears to be in good form, the heart of the village now that the Rose & Crown is closed, and Thrapston now has two pubs in the league, the Fox Inn and Mason Arms, the latter of the two is where I visited recently for a very fine pint of Proper Job IPA.

The Mason Arms has stood at the corner of the old Oundle Road in town since at least the early 19th century, and it's believed the pub may have been known as the Dukes Head prior to this. A former Charles Wells Brewery house, the pub is now in private hands, with Pool, Darts, Live Music at the weekends, and the aforementioned good beer keeping the locals happy.

The Northamptonshire Skittles Table occupies a slightly separate area from the main bar in what was probably a smaller snug room at one time, given that there was originally a separate entrance at the corner of the pub in addition to the current entrance on Huntingdon Road. The throw for the table is on the diagonal given the limited space, a not uncommon occurrence in skittles pubs. So a noisy affair on match days I'm sure, but it's always good to see the Skittles Table in the bar and not tucked away in a function room where few visitors might know it's there for a game.