Short batting straw drawn by Red Star

Red Star have drawn the short straw in the Wairarapa Cricket Association's Umpires Cup senior men's inter-club competition tomorrow.
They will meet high fliers Rathkeale Cricket Academy at the Pugh Sportsbowl in a match which clashes with the Hawke Cup elimination match being played between Wairarapa and Wanganui just over the bridge at the park oval.
Normally you'd expect a team with the outstanding form of Academy to provide a good number of the rep side but Hawke Cup rules allow for only one of them to play at any one time at that level.
So going into tomorrow's action Academy will be only missing all-rounder Chad Yates from their first string combination while Red Star will be without three of their key batsmen in Brad Edwards, Daniel Stoneley and Joe Hull plus spinner Aaron Wilson.
Stoneley, Hull and Wilson are all in the Wairarapa squad and Edwards certainly would have been too but for being unavailable because of a prior commitment.
Red Star are the defending Umpires Cup champions but currently sit second last on the competition table, mainly due to the fact that their batting has been brittle, to say the least.
Therefore, taking three of their better performers in that area out of the equation tomorrow does nothing to inspire confidence in their ability to secure a surprise victory, does it?
Having said that, however, there is one factor which could even things up to a large extent and that is the state of the Sportsbowl pitch. This will be the first senior club fixture played there this season and with pitches usually taking two or three games to "settle in" it could have a few tricks in store.
Invariably it is the batsmen who suffer most when that occurs, something which could help lessen any major advantage Academy might have in that sphere.
Wairarapa College and Lansdowne should have an interesting duel at Wairarapa College although the odds would have to be in Lansdowne's favour through the students being without two of their batting mainstays in Sam Curtis and Robbie Anderson.
Their absence is going to place a heavy burden on the likes of Daniel Ingham, Alex Treseder and the Adamson boys, James and Tom, to come up with something special and how they cope with that challenge will probably decide their team's fate.
The third Umpires Cup fixture was to be played between Greytown and Rathkeale College but the college side have already defaulted, a lucky break for Greytown who would have been severely depleted by representative commitments.
HAWKE CUP By the time these notes are published, the Hawke Cup action at the Park Oval will be well underway weather permitting that is and one hopes the local cricketing fraternity gets along in good numbers to support a Wairarapa team which lacks experience but contains some exciting talent.
Hawke Cup matches, of course, last the two days but that won't mean the action ends for the two protagonists tomorrow night as on Sunday they do battle again, also at the Park Oval, in a Chapple Cup limited-overs fixture.
The shorter version of the game could actually be right up Wairarapa's alley, especially in the batting department where there are a bevy of all-rounders capable of putting bat to ball with telling effect.
In fact, one of the best hitters in the side would be Hayden Spierling, and he is likely to come to the crease at No.10!
Wairarapa skipper Sam Curtis is also in the fortunate position of having any number of bowlers capable of taking wickets while restricting runs at the same time and it will be interesting to see what assistance they receive from a Park Oval pitch which had question marks over it going into the Hawke Cup game.
For those who might have missed it profiles and mug shots of the Wairarapa team were published in Thursday's Times-Age.