Neil Brand will be Muckamore’s overseas professional on Saturday for the visit of joint Premier League leaders Waringstown.

It will be the classy South African batter’s third game for the club this season but he has yet to let them down, scoring 131 against Civil Service North and 65 against Woodvale, helping them to two of their six league victories this season.

“He’s obviously a very good player and we’re hoping to have him for the next two games as well,” confirmed captain Neil Gill. “He's playing in the Lancashire League and he coming over for money, of course, but what I like about him is that he actually cares. He’s great with the boys, gives advice to the young ones and is really good with bat and ball.”

Just for good measure, Brand also scored 144 for Templepatrick – also against Woodvale – at the start of May and his exploits have convinced Gill and Muckamore of the route they will be taking next year.

 “We now know that you have to go and get a ‘gun’ the way some of the other clubs do because it makes a serious difference. Those guys are capable of winning games on their own, which they do most weeks. We have made a mistake the last two years and in fact any year we have been in the Premier League we have never got a gun pro so the club are fully behind getting one next year.”

Brand is one of three professionals that Muckamore have used this season – “that’s the maximum so we have filled our quota” – with Madhav Kaushik scoring 54 in a rearranged League game against North Down in his only appearance just before original choice Randeera Ranasinge played his last game.

 “I’m delighted with our position (currently fourth in the league) because we have had a number of challenges. We lost Allen Coulter – he broke his toe after two games and missed five or six weeks, Ben Calitz didn’t play at all and then left us and we have played matches without a pro. When Randeer did play he just wasn’t up to the standard of the Premier League,” says Gill.

 “So hopefully we can win a couple more and if we finish top four it would be a wonderful achievement. It’s disappointing to be out of the cups this year but another thing we pride ourselves on is that last Saturday we had nine players who started their cricket at Muckamore. I think Civil (Service North) are the only ones would come close, they have five or six guys who started there. So we want to keep that going next year, in fact the two non-locals last week were Sathish (Suresh) and Allen Coulter who was born and bred in Antrim. If we can get a good gun pro in and I think we will be in good shape.”

The visit of Waringstown this weekend, however, brings back horror memories for Gill. The last time they were at Moylena was for their first defence of the Challenge Cup they so gloriously won at Stormont last year – and they were knocked out without the match being completed. Muckamore had to forfeit the match because of a faulty printer which meant they couldn’t produce a DLS sheet after a second innings rain interruption.

“The less said about that the better,” says Gill. “We actually went out and bought two printers so won’t be making that mistake again. Stevie (Wilson, their scorer) was on holiday that week so if had been there I’m sure something would have been done.”

That game, at the end of May, was also Gill’s first of the season as captain, forced to take over again after the resignation of Suresh.

“Captaining a team, it’s the stuff off the pitch that is always tougher than on the field. He’s only 24 and in fairness to Sathish he put his hand up when no-one else wanted it.

“In hindsight I should have stayed on after winning the Challenge Cup but in my eyes I thought, my job’s done here I can’t do anymore. I had it for so many years and I just wanted to play and enjoy it. But having said that I am enjoying skippering again – and I am also more used to the stuff off the field than Sathish!

“I’m looking forward to Saturday. That’s the thing about finishing top six, every week you are playing good sides and that’s where we want to be.  With Brand in, I’ve dropped Marco Bates to the Seconds who have a chance of winning Junior One. So he will keep wicket and open the batting at The Lawn. But he has been brilliant all year for us. I’ve brought in another 15-year-old Josh Wilson to give him a bit of exposure. He’ll be making his debut. But there no pressure on us, we’re not going to win the league but want to finish the season on a high.”

So, having played all the teams, who does Gill think will be this year’s champions.

“Instonians are a cracking side, they have four really top players in (Cade) Carmichael, (Neil) Rock, (Shane) Dadswell and Nikolai (Smith) has been scoring runs and Andy White is still doing a good job. They bowled us out for 87 but we were really poor that day. Randeer had the ‘flu for two weeks, he knew he was going. That was the only day we embarrassed ourselves (on the field). 

“Waringstown are the best all-round team. When full strength they have Greg (Thompson) coming in at six or seven and then Tom Mayes who got 137 against us earlier in the season, after we had them 60 for six. They are my tip for the title.”

Although they suffered their biggest defeat (by 144 runs) last week at Lisburn, three weeks earlier they had won the home game after Jason van der Merwe and Suresh had put on 213 for the third wicket.

“I knew at half-time we had enough although we also bowled really well that day. They had neither of the Adairs or (Matthew) Humphreys but we had no pro. Although Lisburn will struggle when they have so many Irish guys (not playing) and then when the inter-pro seamers are not allowed to bowl.”

But while admitting they are not quite ready to challenge the ‘big three’ Gill is happy to describe the season as a positive.

“We have improved, because we have been playing Premier League for the last couple of seasons. You can see Luke Allen has improved, Luka Bates came in for the Waringstown cup match and hasn’t looked back, he hits a really good length and has taken 13-14 wickets in the league and his wee brother Marco is going to be a real  top cricketer.

“So, yes, it’s been a positive season, there’s been challenges, as always at Muckamore, but on the whole I would love to win a couple more games, finish top four and then look forward and try to get in a top pro for next season.”