With the excitement of the semi-finals of the Irish Senior and National Cups behind us, we turn now to the 11th round of the Russell Court D1/D2 Leagues. While no sensible punter is betting against Clontarf to win the RCD1 title, it will be at least another week before they are able to seal the deal. There will be more interest therefore at the other end of the table where Pembroke continue on their weekend tour of Ireland with a visit to Cork. Pembroke cannot afford any slip ups today as they are currently sitting uncomfortably in the relegation play-off spot. With just about every team other than Clontarf in some degree of danger, even teams in the top half of the table will be looking over their shoulders and fearful of a run of losses that could put them in trouble.
This gives a certain edge to all of today’s games. Leinster will take on YMCA and given that both teams are at the front of the peloton [and have played one game less than the rest] it is probably fair to say that the winner is probably safely through to next season and even the loser should not be overly anxious. The other team that will be feeling reasonably comfortable [and not just because of their excellent win in the ISC semi-final yesterday] will be The Hills. They travel to Phoenix to take on a side that has had a poor run of late. A win by The Hills should be enough to allow them to focus on their forthcoming final. In the fourth match North County take on Clontarf. A loss for the home team could well leave them scrambling to avoid the 7th spot with the most likely other contenders Phoenix and Pembroke. There is really not a lot that can be said about Cork County. a win at home today would leave them with a mathematical chance of survival - but they need a big improvement in performance.
The RCD2 title was decided last weekend and Merrion are on their way back to D1. Malahide [who need 33 points from three games remaining to move into second place] are not in action and can relax after their comfortable win yesterday in the National Cup. Not so for Terenure. Although they have an all-Ireland cup final to look forward to later in the season, the immediate challenge is to get some points [and ideally a win] in their match against Merrion. With Merrion’s two centurions from last week not playing they may feel they have an opportunity to spring a surprise. The other two games - Rush v North Kildare and Railway v Balbriggan - should be interesting contests with all teams looking for points to get them up the table.
There are another 17 OC matches scheduled for this afternoon. A few to look out for.
After Longford’s last gasp win over Merrion IV yesterday in D5, all eyes will be on current leaders Clontarf III. They take on Greystones who are worryingly [for them] very much in danger of relegation.
In D11, Lucan take on Ashbourne to see who is in best position to challenge current league leaders Merrion VI.
And finally, can AIB extend their unbeaten run in D14 v fourth placed Laois III
The Hills:Max Sorensen [C], Mark Donegan [W], Cormac McLoughlin-Gavin, Sean Terry, Hamid Shah, Albert Van der Merwe, Ryan Cartwright, Tomás Rooney Murphy, Naseer Shoukat, Yaqoob Ali, Luke Clinton, Andrew Kavanagh.
Pembroke [from]: Lawson P [C], Balbirnie A, Balbirnie J, Cutler N, Garth JJ, Gupta S, Hogan D, Hopkins R, Lawson T, Little J, McDonough D, Mullen C, Murphy D, Tucker D, Tucker F, Tucker L [W]
Malahide: A Reynolds [C], J Newland, D O'Shea, S Davey, C Riches, A Muntha, P Chase , M Hingston, D O'Halloran, N Boyne, F McAllister [W]
North County:E.Richardson [C}, J.Grassi [W], N.McGovern, T.Sheil, J.Andrews, N.Rooney, A.Sheridan, T.Richardson, C.Sheil, C.Mulvaney, A.Gugale, M.Sludds.
Rush:Stephen Doheny (C/WK), Saadat (Tipu) Gull, Conor Armstrong, Allan Eastwood, Niall Mullen, Dean Brogan, Daniel Coffey, Daniel Thorne, Alex Neary, Aaron McGuire, Jack McGee
Cork:S. Grobler [C], R. Duggan, G. King, M. Bauer, C. Hassett [W], S. Wattoo, S. Joshi, A. O'Reilly, J. Hunter, D. Carey, R. Nappalli
Railway:Kenny Carroll [c], Rachit Gaur, Abdullah Hafeez, Ranil Dhammika, Robin Russell, Dhram Singh, Saad Ullah, Mo Tariq, Furqan ul Haq, Hashir Sultan, Eoghan Grehan
Merrion:D Joyce [C], J Brown, B Lakhotia, T Kane, V Dhiman, P Nice [W], P Blakeney, T Stanton, S Stanton, N Sharma, JJ Walsh.
YMCA:O Gunning (C), T Fisher, J Parkinson, A Blair White, S Murphy (WK), A Lewis, A Shukla, R Gamble, P Flanagan, A Abassi, S Streek
Clontarf:Joe Morrissey[C], Sameer Dutt, Declan Gallagher, Ropu Islam, Waqar Azmat, Bill Coghlan, Robert Forrest, John Mooney, Brad Barnes [W], David Delany, Rob Patterson
Thanks to everyone for getting scores and results in yesterday. It would be great if we could complete the full set today. Remember if you do not use Twitter you can send in the result to the Cricket Leinster mobile at 087-2780309.
For scorers in D1/D2 matches using iPads please upload eScorecards to the Match Centre every five overs [scores@cricketleisnter.ie] with a copy of the eScorecard to cricketleinster@gmail.com