The Write Offs? Heading into Season 11 most will be (probably fairly) completely writing off any chance of the Cyclones making any impact on the Bannerman Shield competition. They look like out right favourites to win the spoon and some may question whether they will even get off the mark in the points table. This does paint a very bleak picture for the club, its players and its members. However, out of the Bureau of Meteorology comes a fresh hope. While in the run up to the start of the season the club went through some difficult off field problems, there is a new found belief around the club that they may be able to cause some upsets in the coming season. The likely reason for this feeling is the fresh, young blood that shall be in the Bannerman Shield this season. Going into round one the Cyclones will not have a wealth of experienced players to call on like many clubs do. There shall only be four players that have completed more than two full seasons in the Bannerman Shield and three of the five main bowlers have never made a single appearance in the competition before the opening day of the season. The latter fact does point to the main, obvious weakness for this season - which is the bowling attack. %MJ Edwards and %J McDougal shall be the opening partnership with the fresh cherry to start the season off. While this might not strike fear into many opening batting partnerships, both of these talents have a point to prove and will be looking to make sure that they are not taken lightly. %MJ Edwards has impressed a lot of people during the offseason and towards the end of last season in the Avo Lovers Cup showed that there was a wicket taking talent there. %J McDougal does already have 45 First Class wickets to his name from non-BS tournaments and he has shown in these games that he may not be the finished article yet, but he can take wickets against some top batsmen. The third newcomer to the Cyclones bowling line-up is %CJ Smith. After joining the Cyclones during last season he has been fast tracked into the BS set-up due to Cyclones legend %SM Green struggling last season. %CJ Smith, like @ JMcDougal, has some previous FC experience from outside of the BS and has been reasonably impressive in these matches notching up 24 wickets at healthy average of 31.58. The Cyclones coaching staff will definitely be looking for more of the same. The brighter note for the club comes on the batting front, where there seems to be an impressive amount of talent floating around. Names such as @AJ O’Neill, %S Verigotta, %EI Morris and %S Masters are some of the brightest up and comers in CricSim. %EI Morris will be considered the batsman who is closest to already reaching his potential. While being a wicket-keeper batsman he would make it into most sides on his batting along. After a good season last season with his former club the Sticky Wickets, Britain and CricSim North, he will be looking to kick on both on and off the field, as he has also taken over as club President. @AJ O’Neill impressed many with his scored of 246 against a good Ravens bowling attack in the Care Cup before the start of the season and he will be looking for more success in the season proper. While being another wicket-keeper, he also looks like he will be someone who will be able to compete for a spot in the team on his batting alone. %S Verigotta and %S Masters both had a good season last season, but will be looking to kick on and both break the 1000 run barrier and hopefully beyond. They have both well and truly left their marks on the ALC, so now need to prove their quality and be recognised as top standard BS batsmen. The inexperienced top 6 will also be backed up by three allrounders in the middle-lower order, who may well be called upon on some occasions when it doesn’t all click which can often happen with inexperienced sides. However, the Cyclones will be hoping they are not needed too often. While the Cyclones know that realistically they are likely to be fighting at the spoon end of the table, other teams may need to under-estimate them at their peril. As we often see in the world of cricket inexperienced, talent may not work in game in game out but on their day they can overcome even the biggest of challengers and they may still be able to have a say in where the title goes at the end of the season.
