OF the four teams competing in tonight’s Royal Hotel Cup Super Sixes double header, just one goes in at full strength.
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Cavaliers will enter tonight’s clash with Orange City, at Wade Park, with a full arsenal at their disposal.
By contrast, the greens go into the clash missing at least four regular players due to the necessary rescheduling.
Cavaliers vice-captain James Ryan said City being short provides his team with a good opportunity to start its Super Sixes campaign with a bang, but is loathe to underestimate the reigning champions.
“It’s certainly something I think we’ll look to take advantage of,” he said.
“It does boost our chances a bit I think but anything can happen in Twenty20, and with the quality of players still in the City team we can’t afford to not be wary of them.”
Ryan conceded his team has not played to its potential in T20 cricket recently.
“On paper, we have the best short-form team in the competition,” he said.
“We have quality all-rounders, and two of the most explosive batsmen in the competition in Richie [Venner] and Stu [Middleton]. We just haven’t put it together in T20 cricket yet. I think we should be disappointed with what we have, or haven’t achieved in T20 cricket so far, but at the end of the day this isn’t the title we’re working towards. Our goal is the two-day, overall title.”
Ryan highlighted his team’s lacklustre batting performances as its downfall in the shortest form of the game.
“Our bowling and fielding have been super so far,” he said.
“But obviously, especially getting bowled out for 83 against CYMS, our batting has let us down a little bit.”
Tonight’s game starts at 5pm, and Warriors skipper Matt Findlay said the time slot is less than ideal for his team.
“We do have a few out,” Findlay explained. Playing on a Wednesday doesn’t bother us, we’re used to that, but starting at 5pm creates a problem. Some guys just can’t get off work that early.
“Regardless, the guys who have come into the side are proven in this competition, they’ve all played at some stage over the past two seasons. With the depth we have in the club we don’t lose anything quality wise.
“We’ll go in expecting to win, as we do every other game.”