1st XI face high-flying West of Scotland on Saturday

The 1st XI are back on home turf on Saturday for their Western Premiership One match versus West of Scotland. Earlier in the season, the side gained a good win over the Glasgow club at their famous Hamilton Crescent ground and the players will be keen to do the double this weekend.

Back in May, at the conclusion of the match, West were sitting in mid table having won two and lost two of the four games played. Since then the Glasgow side has lost only once and won seven league games and now occupy second top spot behind leaders Ayr and just marginally ahead of Ferguslie.

Indeed the Partick team are unbeaten since the end of May and have beaten Ayr, Ferguslie and Prestwick who occupy positions in the top half of the league.

So it will be quite a task to get the better of them for a second time this season.

But due to their lowly league position, the side have a real will to win. And, of course, the team know that they can get the better of West.

The team to play on Saturday will show three changes from last Saturday's loss at Ferguslie. Unavailable are Nikhil Kadyan, Tom Forrest and Chirag Pandher. Also still out due to work commitments are Shailesh Prabhu and Cammy Calder.

Coming into the team are Chris Hempsey, Jamie Nowell and PJ Bryceland.

Captain Greg McDougall said, "Saturday's match against West is a big game for us. Although we have a number of players unavailable who might have featured in the game, we have eleven players who will give their all to achieve a second win over West.

"The players have been working hard in training and if we can bat and bowl as I know we can, then a win for us is definitely possible."

In Rahul Dalal, the team have a professional who has delivered with the bat in numerous league matches so far. He scored a winning unbeaten century against West in May and has also made unbeaten centuries against Prestwick and Stenhousemuir as well as 90 against league leaders Ayr.

Another big innings from him on Saturday will give his team a great chance of another win. But others in the side must work hard to support him and build important partnerships.

Tom Polkinghorne and Lukas Fischer-Keogh have both had good partnerships with Dalal during the season and if they can spend an extended time out in the middle on Saturday, the team could be on track to give West a very challenging afternoon.

Others in Saturday's side who could provide important runs include Harry Briggs, Chris Hempsey and Gregor Chambers.

However, key to getting a big total is building partnerships and to do so the players need to concentrate and graft when they get out into the middle. And if batting first it will be crucial to bat all the way through the 50 overs of the innings.

West will come to Glenpark full of confidence as a result of having won their last seven matches. The Hamilton Crescent team have been fortunate to be able to field a fairly consistent side during the season and it is one which has a lot of experience.

Moneeb Iqbal is West's leading run-scorer with 406 league runs averaging 67.67. He joined West at the start of the season from Uddingston and is a former Scottish senior international. He has played for a number of clubs currently in the Premiership including Greenock back in season 2009.

However Iqbal is likely to be unavailable as he has been called in as one of the backroom coaching team to assist Scotland Interim Head Coach, Doug Watson for the ICC Men's T20 World Cup Europe Qualifier competition involving eight countries which is being held in Edinburgh from Thursday 20 July until Friday 28 July.

If Iqbal is not available to play, then West will be weakened. But the Glasgow side is far from being a one man team in terms of run-scoring as John Oliver, Shubhang Sharma and Kess Sajjad each have scored in excess of 200 league runs.

And as regards wicket-taking, West captain James Fennah is the team's top bowler with 24 wickets and also the Premiership One's leading wicket-taker. And there are three others who have taken 15 or more league wicket - John Oliver (20), Calum Duttia (18) and Dave McNulty (15).

So West have a strong all round side and one which the 1st XI will do well to beat for a second time on Saturday.

First of all though it may be the weather which Saturday's match will have to beat. The forecast is an unsettled one with low pressure and lots of rain heading in the Glenpark direction. Weather permitting, the match will start at 12 noon.

The Glenpark XI have had very little cricket in recent weeks so they will hope that the forecast for the weekend is wrong and that their game against Clydesdale Cavaliers can go ahead at Hamilton Palace Sports Ground as scheduled. The first game against these opponents resulted in a facile 10 wickets win as the Glasgow side was dismissed for just 38 runs.

Skipper Eddie Ahmad would no doubt welcome a repeat to keep the side in the top half of the Championship Three table, although he will presumably want to bat first this time. The selected side looks to be well capable of obtaining the win points. The match is scheduled to start at 12 noon.

The Club is grateful for the continued sponsorship from Cleaning Supplies 4U.