QUIDDITCH players from far and wide descended on Oxford in an attempt to make the grade for the sport’s premier league.

Former Oxford University student Jack Lennard, 22, is the founding director of the Quidditch Premier League (QPL) – a competition based on the sport played by fictional wizard Harry Potter.

The new league will get under way this summer and players were given the opportunity to try out for the Southeast Knights in University Parks on Sunday.

Mr Lennard said: “We’re all really excited. If everything goes as well as it is at the moment it should be something unlike anything the sport has seen before in the UK.

“The try outs have really worked to get people excited about their region.”

Each of the eight teams in the QPL is hosting two try outs to fill their team with the 30 players needed.

The league’s first fixture will fall on June 17, with the championship to be held on August 26.

Mr Lennard said that seeing the league progress so successfully was 'incredibly emotional'.

Dreamed up by Harry Potter author JK Rowling, the fictional sport of Quidditch involves characters flying through the air on broomsticks.

In the game’s real-world equivalent, invented by two Vermont students in 2005, players hold a broom between their legs and run around a pitch.

The sport is played by 750 people across the UK.

For more visit quidditchpremierleague.com