More than a World Cup gold could be at stake next weekend for Andy Hodge in Switzerland.

The British pair of Hodge, from Hebden, near Skipton, and Pete Reed were left facing questions about their future in the pairs class after suffering a comprehensive defeat to chief rivals Eric Murray and Hamish Bond last weekend at Henley.

The world champions from New Zealand won the Silver Goblets and Nickalls Challenge Cup final easily at Henley on Sunday – the verdict given for a victory of more than five lengths.

It was Hodge and Reed’s ninth successive defeat to the dominant Kiwi pair.

Britain’s flagship crew had been steadily closing the gap on Murray and Bond, from clear water at the start of last season to just a third of a length at the last World Cup regatta in Munich.

Hodge is desperate to prove at the Lucerne World Cup next weekend that last weekend’s margin of defeat was due to Henley’s river conditions and not because the pair have fallen further back.

But another defeat to the Kiwis in Switzerland could prompt British coach Jurgen Grobler to bite the bullet and rethink his plans for the World Championships in November.

British rowing legend Sir Steve Redgrave believes Hodge and Reed will return to the men’s four, the boat in which they won gold at the Beijing Olympics, in time for London 2012.

“That is Jurgen’s decision,” said Hodge. I can’t think about that.

“At the moment we are analysing what we did here and putting into place what we need for Lucerne. From there we will take another look.

“We came to Henley to have a good race and to put in our best performance. It felt like we were in a good place and we led for quite a while. We felt good and long and strong. It felt like a good platform to maintain through the race.

“But it seemed like over five strokes everything changed. I could see we were matching them stroke for stroke and then suddenly everything went ‘bang’ and I saw them disappear.

“I am looking forward to getting to some proper water and to a decent course, a decent event and to see if this was us or if it was Henley.

“We will learn more in Lucerne if this was our best performance.

“If that was us then you have got to dig deep inside your head and think ‘how are we going to improve this, how are we going to get better?’ because there is no way a crew should walk away from us like that. No way.”

There was also disappointment for the previously undefeated British double scull of Matt Wells, from Bradford, and Marcus Bateman who suffered a crushing defeat to the French.

Wells and Bateman won gold at the first two World Cup regattas of the season and were favourites to over-haul a strong French crew to win the Double Scull Challenge.

But, after a poor start, they never found their rhythm and at around the six-minute mark, Bateman’s head went down and Britain were broken and they stopped racing to gift Club France the win.

On a brighter note for Britain there were victories for both the women’s quad, stroked by three-time Olympic silver-medallist Katherine Grainger, and the men’s quad.

Grainger stroked the women to a five-length victory over Waiariki Rowing Club from New Zealand in the Princess Grace Challenge Cup.

The men’s quad, racing as Reading and Leander, beat Princeton Training Center by two lengths to win the Queen Mother Challenge Cup.