Clubs get under way

Cricket Weekend previews: Boosted by the promise of good weather, the competitive club season gets under way this weekend, with the players already having warmed up (in a manner of speaking) in rain-damaged friendlies over the last two Saturdays and Sundays.

While this is just the start of the Leinster Senior League, sponsored by Lewis Hohn Williams, one Section B match looks likely to attract the most attention: the meeting today at Balrothery of North County and Phoenix.

Phoenix won the Senior League last season, while North County won the Leinster Senior (Conqueror) Cup for the first time before going on to capture the Irish Senior Cup for the second time in three years.

Given home advantage, this looks like a victory for North County. But Phoenix, already strong all round, will be boosted by their newest acquisition, Thinnus Fourie, who has left homely Clontarf and Castle Avenue for the wider open spaces of The Park.

Clontarf, at home to Old Belvedere today, have acquired the services of the talented Australian all-rounder Trent Johnston as player-coach. Johnston played for Carlisle and Pembroke during previous Irish sojourns.

The Leinster Cricket Union's senior competitions committee apparently has voiced objections to Johnston playing on the grounds of some registration technicality. This seems odd, given that he already has played here and is, in fact, eligible to play for Ireland and possesses an Irish passport.

Let's hope that good sense prevails and that the cricketing equivalent of the Battle of Clontarf can be avoided.

Finally, the all-male bastion of the Leinster Cricket Umpires' Association has been breached by Aoife Sheridan. Sheridan will umpire her first match tomorrow as Phoenix III and Railway Union II meet in the Leinster Senior Three League in The Park.