Fort Augustus prepared to make debut in North of Scotland Cricket Association's Senior League away at defending champions Forres St Lawrence
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Fort Augustus Cricket Club captain Kevin O'Meara insists the team are well-prepared for their debut in the North of Scotland Senior League.
This Saturday marks the first match Fort Augustus will play in the competition after stepping up from the Reserve League, becoming the sixth side in the division alongside Northern Counties, Forres St Lawrence, Elgin, Nairn County and Ross County.
They face arguably the toughest start possible away to defending champions Forres, but O'Meara is confident the team can be competitive.
"I'm very happy with the team that we've got this year," he revealed.
"We've got a couple of new additions who have really helped, and we've got the old guard, five or six players who used to play for Fort William.
"That's not making our debut as daunting as it could be. Even though we're a new club, people will know our faces from previous years.
"Having experienced players that have played Senior League cricket before, they're used to players like (Forres batters) Pal Dhami and Gus Farr from the other clubs.
"To be fair, we've been very close to beating Forres before as Fort William. I don't think they're as strong this year – it's hard to judge obviously in the first week of the season, but you can normally tell by looking at the names on the teamsheet.
"There was nobody that really concerned us apart from the normal – Pal Dhami and Gus Farr. They're batting is always going to be strong, but I think our bowling attack is probably stronger than theirs.
"With them having one of the best batters in the league, he always seems to score centuries against us. We never seem to get him out early, but if we can then their team revolves around him, so it would put them under pressure.
"If we can get him out early, we would be very confident of keeping them to a low total and then pushing on to get a victory."
High hopes at the Abbey
Fort Augustus are certainly not going to be far behind their rivals when it comes to match preparation.
Continued growth over recent years has been helped by owner Bim Sandu of the Highland Club, who is now also the sponsor of the whole league and has invested into the club through an artificial pitch and other ground maintenance.
It certainly seems like a club on the rise thanks to the hard work of O'Meara and club chairman Pete Shepherd, and at a ground where cricket can trace its origins to monks playing the sport a long time ago, success on the pitch in 2022 would certainly be a divine outcome.
"Realistically I would like to win 50 per cent of our games, but if we get off to a good start I don't think there's any reason we can't finish in the top two or three," O'Meara reasoned.
"I know that sounds a bit exuberant to be that optimistic so soon in the season, but if we can get our strongest team out on the day – which as captain it's my job to do – I know that we've got the capabilities to win the games that we were losing last time where we would lose games with the odd dropped catch, or a run or two at the end.
"We've also got a really exciting talent coming up from Shropshire this year who has just come to the area, called Charlie Thornton. I have good expectations that he will help our batting, he's a coach and he's got all the health and safety standards. He's a really good asset to the club.
"There are quite a lot of new Indian business around here. Black Sheep hotels have taken over quite a lot of different ventures around Fort William and Fort Augustus, including the Invergarry area.
"We've picked up quite a few youngsters and their parents from that, so we've definitely got five or six new faces this year.
"We felt we wouldn't be able to compete in both Nosca leagues this year, but that's definitely something we will look at for next season now that we have 16 or 17 people to keep happy."
