I doubt the problem is with Try::Tiny. This kind of problem is caused by bugs in Perl code or code that uses Perl as a library (XS code, B::, etc), and Try::Tiny doesn't have anything that. In fact, it's a tiny (living up to its name) and straightforward (nothing fancy) Perl module.

Start by trying your code on 5.10.1. Lots of bug fixes there.

I have built a default build of 5.10.1. It probably does not match how ubuntu build it (I don't know how they build it). When I run the problem code now I get the following on the console:

Variable "$clientref" is not available at /home/martin/server/q.pl.pan
+ics line 1894, <GEN506> line 1.
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It is strange as that line is the "};" at the end of the catch block. Although $clientref is referenced in the try block it is created above with a my at the start of the sub containing the try.

Great! That's an unrelated error that you would need to fix no matter which version of Perl you were using.

You're trying to capturing something, but Perl didn't capture it because it didn't think it needed too. It tries to capture the minimum amount of varaibles.

Note that

try { ... } catch { ... };
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is the same as

try(sub { ... }, catch(sub { ... }));
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The error occurs with eval EXPR:

$ perl -wle'
    sub f { my $x = "abc"; sub { eval q{"[$x]"} } };
    print f()->();
'
Variable "$x" is not available at (eval 1) line 1.
Use of uninitialized value in print at -e line 1.
[]
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The workaround is to make sure the sub references the lexical variables you will need in the eval EXPR:

$ perl -wle'
    sub f { my $x = "abc"; sub { $x if 0; eval q{"[$x]"} } };
    print f()->();
'
[abc]
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I'll try 5.10.1 but that will take a while to build and then install all the modules. It will also be annoying if it is fixed in 5.10.1 as this box is currently only using a packaged perl and I think the only upgrade path would be to delete the packaged perl and build our own (thus losing the benefit of the package system). There is some XS code (DBD::Oracle) inside the try and catch blocks but it works inside a simple eval (but then again, as you say Try::Tiny is really only an eval wrapper).