Cricket North: South Launceston calls on veteran

Nine and a half points behind third-placed Riverside on the re-calculated Cricket North ladder, the Knights need a big win over Mowbray to book a spot in next weekend's semi-final, likely against Westbury.

South captain Sean Harris said his side had underperformed this season, but would have a red-hot crack at finals if given the chance.

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"If we did a summary of our season so far, we probably don't deserve to make finals but the fact that we're still in it ... we'll certainly give it our best shot this weekend," he said.

"We've missed opportunities throughout the whole season ... it was a really important toss for us to win last week on a pretty average batting wicket and Westbury batted pretty well and we just bowled poorly - we dropped half a dozen catches and played ourselves out of the game."

The Knights are set to make three changes for the Invermay Park clash, with Andrew Nichols recalled, Sisitha Jayasinghe back from suspension and ex-Westbury veteran Page set for his first club senior outing since 2012.

"He's been making a few runs in the twos and now they're out of the finals race we're just keen to get him back into first grade and hopefully he can make a contribution for us," Harris said.

On the flipside, James Storay's Mowbray is out to finish the season on a high after a defiant performance at Riverside last weekend.

The Eagles saw out 70 overs on the final day as a two-and-a-half hour knock from Jonty Nicolson culminated in a maiden half-century.

"He was composed and summed up a situation where time was probably the most important factor - the runs came second and he did really well," Storay said.

"At 15 years old he showed a fair bit of maturity and is part of what we're trying to [do with] the young kids, put time into them and see reward for effort later on."

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The Eagles are out to finish the season with wins over both of last year's finalists, having knocked off Westbury before Christmas.

"I think we're looking forward to playing South and to really finish off the season well," Storay said.

"I think it's pretty important for taking momentum through to next season and building from a platform that we've built over the last couple of years."

WESTBURY and Launceston will round out the season proper with a top-of-the-table clash.

Barring an outright Shamrocks win, the Lions will stroll through to the grand final, moving to within one victory of their first Cricket North flag in 10 years.

Alistair Taylor's side will be without star spinner James Curran, who has moved to Melbourne for university but will return for finals, however, Raiders pair Sam Elliston-Buckley and Will Bennett are both available.

"We've trained pretty hard the last couple of weeks so the boys are pretty excited to come up against a red-hot Westbury team," Taylor said.

"Nothing changes too much in how we've gone about things from game to game this year, we just want to go out there and play our best cricket and hopefully the result goes our way."

Westbury have recalled Alex Kerrison and Jordan French as straight swaps for Jesse Digney and Liam Ryan, but skipper Dan Murfet said several players could still earn their way back into first-grade in finals.

Since a disappointing end to their Greater Northern Cup campaign, the Shamrocks have won three two-dayers on the trot but will have to be at their best to overcome the Lions.

"It's a nice little test for us before we go into a semi-final," Murfet said.

"Launny have been the form team all year ... we know they're a good unit.

"They've got a good mix of batting, bowling and fielding, so we'll certainly be tested."

Westbury inflicted Launceston's sole loss this season - a six-wicket result in the T20 cup final - but have lost twice to the Lions in one-dayers.

"We know we didn't play anywhere near our best in the Greater Northern Cup final and in the one-dayer we let them off way too much with our bowling, which is something uncharacteristic of us, so we've taken a fair bit out of those two games," Murfet said.