Cricket North: Riverside's high hopes for elusive grand final

The Blues finished third on the ladder to reach their first finals series since 2016-17, but aren't content with a preliminary final appearance.

"It's a good opportunity for all the hard work we've done," skipper Tom Garwood said.

"[A grand final] is something we've been striving to do for a couple of years now - unfortunately we've missed out the last couple of years - but we're in there with a chance so we're very excited.

"We're ready to go on Saturday and we've got some high hopes."

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Sitting out round 16 with the bye, the Blues had a nervous wait over the weekend as South Launceston chased the 9.5 points needed to secure their 10th-straight finals appearance.

But bottom-placed Mowbray sealed an unlikely win - just their second of the season - to send the Blues sailing through.

"We always thought if Scotty [Luke Scott] can make runs and [James] Storay's obviously a pretty good bowler ... we knew they'd put up a fight, especially in the last game of the year," Garwood said.

"The weather came in as well so everything went our way."

The Blues will field a similar XI to the side that overcame Mowbray in round 15, with James Simpson (unavailable) the only known out.

Garwood's Blues have struggled against the Shamrocks this year, losing by 41 runs (one-dayer), 10 wickets (one-dayer and two-dayer) and six wickets (T20), but are yet to bring their best against the reigning premiers.

"Westbury match up very well against us, so we'll be changing a couple of things and changing our tactics a bit," Garwood.

"If we play our best cricket for a longer period of time we'll definitely be playing in a grand final."

Chasing their third-straight flag and 10^th straight grand final appearance, Dan Murfet's Shamrocks will go in unchanged after becoming the first side to beat Launceston outside of a T20 this season.

Murfet said his side would take confidence out of the seven-wicket win, which saw Westbury finish the home and away campaign seven points off top spot.

"They're going to be eager, they haven't played in a grand final for a while so they're going to be coming red-hot towards us," Murfet said.

"Yes we had an outright and yes we beat them in the one-dayer, but we know that they're capable of playing some really good cricket so we've got to make sure that we're at our best.

"We know that if we play our best cricket that no one is the comp is going to beat us."

Coach Matthew Battle has been a huge acquisition since returning after the Christmas period, notching a match-winning 108 not out in last weekend's seven-wicket win.

"He's a really well-liked person around the club and when he's doing well he makes everyone else a little bit happier as well," Murfet said.

"Some of the shots he played were unbelievable, if you send a good ball down he can still hit that for four and he played some unbelievable shots on the weekend, it was magnificent to watch.

"He's one of those cricketers that I'm sure any team would be happy to have, he's been really good since he came back in."

Play begins at 11am both days.