The red and blacks take on City Colts at Loco Oval on Saturday in the Bathurst and Orange Inter District Cricket competition.

This is Roberts' first season in the top flight after joining the club mid-way through last season.

He averaged 32 with the bat in second grade during the 2020/21 campaign and picked up five wickets, all of which came in a semi-final win over Cavaliers.

"I had a good finish to the year in seconds last year and with the change of captaincy to Ed (Dodds) and a few other things around the club got me to take the step up and I jumped at it," he said of his appointment to first grade.

"It's good to be playing a good level of cricket again.

"It's good fun playing with a good bunch of lads, but it's also a good comp. Everyone we come up against are good cricketers and the facilities are great."

The all-rounder has already repaid that faith, taking a pair of wickets and scoring 48 in last weekend's victory over Centennials Bulls.

"It was great, especially after all the washouts," he said of the victory.

"We haven't had a chance to play much cricket so it was nice to get out there and get a win.

"We've had some fantastic training sessions and we've been getting plenty of people around it. The club's got four teams now so we've had plenty of blokes at training and all just rearing to go, especially after the late start to the season."

Centrals currently sit in seventh place, tied on points with this weekend's opponents.

"The feel around the team is really good and looking at the table, we're hoping to try and crack that top five before Christmas and set ourselves up for a go in the new year," Roberts said.

"With all the washouts there's obviously not as many points on the table as we'd might've liked, so every point is important from here. We definitely want to be in finals and the closer we can get to the top of the table the better."

Should the rain hold off, this will mark the first two-day match of the season.

"We're looking forward to it, being able to get the whites on, settle into a game, spend some time in the middle and get back to that grind," Roberts said of the format change.

"You know that if you play it smart and wait for the right ball you can play yourself right into a game.

"There's also that attrition aspect where all of those things you throw into the one day game, you've got to be able to prolong that. You need to have the depth to your bowling, depth to your batting and play in partnerships more so than some of the slap and dash in the 40 over stuff."

Other round six BOIDC games this weekend include: Orange City v Bathurst City at Bloomfield Oval, Cavaliers v St Pat's Old Boys at Riawena, Rugby Union v CYMS at Morse Park 1 and Centennials v O.R.C.

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