The Eagles were bowled out for 174 by South Launceston last week after a seventh-wicket partnership of 94 between Jarrod Freeman (88) and Luke Scott (33) rescued the innings and gave them a total to bowl at.

The Knights were 1-1 in reply at stumps and Mowbray captain John Le Fevre knows they will need to make early inroads into the South batting line-up to have any hope of grabbing the points.

“It wasn’t an ideal start last week – South bowled and fielded pretty well early on and put a lot of balls in good areas which our top five couldn’t handle,” Le Fevre said.

“Obviously from there to fight back and post 174, after being 6-38, was a really good effort and our game is situated probably 50-50 for us at this stage.

“It is a bit of a guessing game and we are pleased to have runs on the board and getting the key wicket of Sean Harris last week and hopefully we will have some plans for others in their middle order– if we can get a a couple of breakthroughs early it will go a long way to securing a good finish for us in the game.”

South Launceston coach Mark Nutting said he was confident that his side had the batting depth and confidence to chase down the runs on what he hoped would be a good Invermay Park wicket.

Riverside face a big run chase at Windsor Park after Westbury piled on the runs to finish at 4-329, with English import Dave Rodgers hitting a century.

Dan Anderson is set to resume batting on 46 not out with Sean Stevenson (0) depending on whether captain Michael Lukic decides to declare or not.

“Obviously that’s a discussion I’ll have with the team leaders to see how we want to go about things because we’ve got Matthew Battle to come in and he’s a pretty handy player to still have in the sheds,” Lukic said.

“But we’ll see how it pans out and it is going to be a big day for us either way whether we choose to bowl first or keep batting on.”

Riverside captain Alex Saunders knows his side faces a big challenge to salvage anything from the game.

“We weren't at our best with the ball and great batting conditions made for a long day in the field,” Saunders said. “I'm sure our boys will be keen to get out there and bat the day but we need to get those last few wickets before we worry too much about that.”