MACQUARIE Hotel captain Josh Hyde has to rack his brain to remember the last time his team had a bat in their hands.
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For the record, it was three weeks ago when Macquarie successfully chased down 80 to register outright points against Port Pirates.
Ironically, Pirates also find themselves in a similar situation where they haven’t ventured out to the middle with the pads on in the same period of time.
“We need to be playing some cricket,” Hyde said.
“The last time we batted was a couple of weeks ago and we’re now at that time of the year where you want to be playing regularly.”
Macquarie will be understrength for their clash with Port City Leagues Magpies at Wayne Richards Park on Saturday.
Hyde said about half a dozen of his regular first graders would be missing including Sam Ward and Adrian Sippel.
“It’s a bit of a danger game for us in the sense that we’ve got quite a few out,” he said.
“We know Port City could do a fair bit of damage if they win the toss and bat first because they have a fair bit to play for.
“Kyle won’t want to finish the year as being the captain of a side who finished last.”
By not having a result in last week’s two-day games, Hyde said there was now the risk the remainder of the season could be little more than an extended net session for some teams.
“You now have the chance that teams will bat their second innings with nothing on their mind other than to get some time in the middle because they can’t get a result,” he said.
Port Pirates captain Kenny Bennett would like to put his feet up for a week.
He’s sick of bowling.
“That’s been the case all year,” he said.
“There was a heatwave last week and we bowled all day the week before so it seems we haven’t done much batting recently.”
Pirates clash with Wauchope at Andrews Park in a match which sees the absentees almost cancel each other out.
Ethan McKenna, Robbie Parker and Matt Day will miss the match for RSL, while Jeremy Cowin, Ryan McMahon and Jack Connolly won’t be in the Pirates top six with the bat.
It provides an opportunity for some of their second graders to make a name for themselves.
“That’s been the story all year where we’ve had players missing,” Bennett said.
“But Wauchope have had the edge over us this year so we’ll see how we go on the day.”
RSL captain Matt Miller will look to the spin of Bailey Smith and the form of Nathan Lyon at the top of the batting order to help his side out of trouble.
“We’ll certainly be a bit understrength,” he said.
“But we’ll still have Andrew Murrell and I’m hoping for a big innings from Nigel McKenna.”
The matches at Andrews Park and Wayne Richards will have the first ball bowled at 1pm.