Laura Covill

I was born in 1995 in Oxford, where my parents still live a few metres from the Oxford Bridge Club. I was first selected for the England U26 girls’ team in December 2013, ostensibly because I can tell the difference between spades and clubs (which according to Michael Byrne is all you need to be able to do before they’ll let you play bridge for England) but more likely for plying the entire U20s squad with cake. Since then I have played in 7 Channel Trophies, the White House tournament, and the 2018 World Championships for the girls’ team. With the U20 team, I played the Peggy Bayer and the 2015 European Championships. I have partnered Alex Birchall, Stephen Kennedy, Siyu Ren, and Ewa Wieczorek; outside of the England teams I have partnered Thibo Sprinkhuizen (NL) to win the White House Junior Pairs, and Esther Visser (NL) to a bronze medal in the 2019 World Youth Open Championships.

After spending a year as a researcher in molecular neurogenetics at the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics, I have also achieved a BSc in Biochemistry from King’s College London and an MSc in genetics from the University of York. I am now working towards a PhD in molecular genetics of immunological disease at Karolinska Institutet in Sweden, and spending all my student loan on tea and bridge.

Last updated: January 2020

Major International Selections:
Junior European Championships: 2015
Peggy Bayer Trophy Selections: 2015
World Youth Team Championships: 2018
Junior Camrose Selections: 2018 (EBU team) and 2020
Junior Channel Trophy: 2018 and 2019
White House Junior Teams: 2019