Four matches this weekend, all involving contests North v South. The pick of the day is the clash at Claremont Road between the league leaders YMCA and Clontarf. Last week the visitors took down the R5 leaders Merrion, and this week they will try for a repeat. Clontarf travel with a full squad but YMCA will be missing Jarred Barnes who is injured.
Clontarf: Joe Morrissey [C], Robert Forrest [W], Declan Gallagher, Shariful Islam, Waqar Azmat, Obus Pienaar, David Delany, Conor Kelly, Sameer Dutt, Bill Coghlan, Andrew Pointer.
YMCA: Jack Tector [C], Sam Murphy [W], Oliver Gunning, Simi Singh, Harry Tector, Bobby Gamble, Padraic Flanagan, PJ Moor, Asher Abbassi, Aviral Shukla, James Parkinson.
The ‘Match of the Day’ is between North County and Pembroke. North County are in a good vein of form and have won their last two games. With home advantage they will present a major challenge for Pembroke. Pembroke currently lie sixth in the league will be keen to create some distance between themselves and the play off / relegation spots.
North County have Andrew Sheridan and Craig May back into their squad otherwise they are the same as last weekend. Pembroke are without Josh Little. Scott Ruttle makes his senior debut.
North County: [from] Niall McGovern [C], Jamie Grassi [W], Malcolm Nofal, Jonno Andrews, Tomas Sheil, Adam Coughlan, Conor Sheil, Sean Kingston, Cian Mulvanny, Andrew Sheridan, Eddie Richardson, Craig May
Pembroke: Fiachra Tucker [C], Theo Lawson [W], Diarmaid Tucker, Paul Lawson, Jack Balbirnie, Andrew Balbirnie, JJ Garth, Alex Ridley, Gavin Hoey, Benn Hoey, Scott Ruttle.
Leinster and The Hills meet at Rathmines. Neither team has had the best start to the season with only one win each. So this could be a really tense affair with a lot at stake. The Hills field the same team as last week. Leinster make one change with Danny Coad coming in for Anees Ahmed.
The Hills: Max Sorensen [C], Mark Donegan [W], Albert van der Merwe, Sean Terry, Nicolaas Pretorius, Tomas Rooney Murphy, Andrew Kavanagh, Harry Archer, Luke Clinton, Daya Singh, Nazeer Shoukat.
Leinster: George Dockrell [C], Ian O'Herlihy [W], Gareth Delany, Joe Carroll, Danny Coad, Saqib Bahadur, Bilal Azhar, Fionn O’Sullivan, Finn Conaty, Craig Mallon, Monil Patel.
The final game is at Anglesea Road where Merrion take on Phoenix. Both teams have individual match winners and the game could turn on a performance from one of these. Merrion have been very competitive in all of their games so far, and have as a result amassed a lot of bonus points, but they will be under pressure after last week’s loss to stay in contention at the top of the table.
Merrion make four changes from last weekend’s league team bringing in David Langford Smith, Bravesh Lakhotia, Niranjan Shankar and Sean Stanton. Phoenix make two changes with James Maginnis and Ben White coming into the team.
Merrion: Dom Joyce [C], Patrick Tice [W], John Anderson, Tyrone Kane, Tom Stanton, Jack Carty, Poonish Mehta, David Langford Smith, Bhavesh Lakhotia, Niranjan Shankar, Sean Stanton.
Phoenix: Tom Anders [C], Reinhardt Strydom, Richie Lawrence, Rory Anders, Brad Kneebone, Fletcher Coutts, Ali Kervalas, James Maginnis, Ben White, Adam Chester