Unofficial league table only.
With most of the refixed matches from R10 completed last night [Clontarf v North County takes place on Thursday] we can finally get a clear look at the Premier League with three full rounds to go. In the race for the title Merrion strengthened their position by securing another full point win. With NC and Clontarf playing each other it should be clear by the weekend who is likely to be the main challenger to Merrion. Last night Merrion had a comfortable nine wicket win over Pembroke with the Merrion spin attack doing the damage and bowling their visitors out for 92 [Tom Stanton 3/12, Niranjan Shankar 3/21, John Anderson 2/13]. An undefeated half-century from Poonish Mehta saw Merrion home without incident.
What has put Merrion in such a strong position is the high number of bonus points they have achieved so far this season. So far they have 47 points - over 4 per per match. This means that if they end up on the same number of wins as any other team - they will win the league. It is not inconceivable that the margin of bonus points over their nearest rival could actually equate to an additional win. Merrion go into the last three rounds in poll position with fixtures v Phoenix, The Hills [both fighting to avoid relegation] and Clontarf.
The most likely challenger based on performance this year and the way the fixtures fall is Clontarf. Provided they can overcome North County in their refix they just need to do enough to stay in touch until the final weekend when they take on Merrion in Anglesea Road. Before this they have games against Pembroke and YMCA. Potentially difficult ties but they will hope that middle of the table safety for the two southside teams may dull their edges somewhat.
The third potential challenger for the title is North County. They have the most difficult route. First they have to beat Clontarf and then have games against Pembroke, Phoenix and Leinster. Even with victories in all these games, and they will probably require wins with a lot of bonus points, they still need Clontarf or one of the other sides to do them a favour and beat Merrion in the run in.
Matters are equally interesting among the bottom three teams. Taking into account last night’s results which saw Leinster beat fellow strugglers Phoenix and The Hills narrowly losing to YMCA - we now have three teams with the same win/loss profile [i.e. 3 / 8]. Again the critical factor is the bonus points with The Hills having 18 more than Phoenix and 13 over Leinster. This means that the two bottom teams will likely require a full win more than The Hills to overtake them.
What does the run in for the three sides look like. Phoenix, who after last night have dropped to last place in the table, have perhaps the most difficult task with games v Merrion and North County before taking on The Hills in the final game. Their best hope is that they can stay in touch with The Hills over the next two rounds so that they can make their last game into a cup final shoot out.
Leinster take on The Hills in the next round and this could well prove to be their most important match of the season. A win here would see them with a clear path to survival. A loss - and the best they can reasonably hope for is to stay above Phoenix and take the play-off spot. Their other two games are against YMCA and North County. A challenging run in certainly but given where Leinster were at the halfway point of the season they must count their performance in the second series of games a recovery. If they can bring it off it would be comparable to the run of form they had last season in coming from behind to take the title.
And finally, The Hills have suffered a number of narrow defeats this season and have been competitive throughout. Perhaps they can count themselves unlucky. But the positive side is that they have amassed enough bonus points to ensure that their fate is entirely in their own hands. With two of their matches against immediate rivals they probably need only a win in one of these to ensure they avoid the relegation spot. Depending on how the other teams go they may need two wins to ensure they are not faced with a play-off. Of the three teams they are in the most comfortable position - but it they lose their two critical head to heads, with their third game v Merrion, things could turn out badly. So no room for complacency.