Cricket: New Pudsey St Lawrence captain Ashley Metcalfe will be looking for a winning start against his old club Farsley when the Bradford League season starts tomorrow.

The former Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire batsman who has taken over as skipper from Chris Gott leads a team strengthened by new signing, 6ft 4ins Australian pace bowler Marc Nickl and the return of batsmen James Smith and Gareth Clough from Yorkshire Academy.

Pudsey Congs skipper Matthew Doidge who moved from Farsley during the winter leads his new side in an away match against last season's Second Division champions Cleckheaton.

Defending champions Brad-ford & Bingley ought to make a winning start against Yorkshire Bank at Wagon Lane. They will miss the all-round strength of Gareth Batty, who signed a two year contract with Surrey, for most of the season although he plays tomorrow. However, they have recruited Yorkshire Academy batsman Richard Wilkinson.

Baildon who were pipped for the title on the last day of season start with a derby match at Windhill, now captained by all-rounder Mark Bradford who has returned from Australia.

And 1997 champions Under-cliffe, who have made significant signings during the winter including former Yorkshire and Somerset all-rounder Jeremy Batty and Yorkshire batsman Bradley Parker, will be looking to improve on their lower half of table position of last season.

Parker misses the early matches through injury, but Undercliffe will fancy their chances of beating Spen Victoria at Intake Road.

In the Second Division, all eyes will be on new club Esholt who replaced Ben Rhydding at the end of last season. They start with a home match against Lidget Green.

Former Bradford League side Ben Rhydding start life in the Leeds League tomorrow with a visit to Rothwell. After struggling to make an impact in the Bradford League, skipper Andrew Jennings is confident they will do better this year.

"We are all looking forward to the challenge,'' he said. "We've lost Dominic Kelly to Esholt, but other than that we have almost the same team as last season."

Baildon (at Windhill): M Emerson, R Robinson, C Chapman, A Scholtz, P Spragg, Simon Davies, Stephen Davies, M Bray, R Towler, C Hitchenor, J Marshall. Sunday (home to Carlton) in the Heavy Woollen Cup: A Taylor for John Marshall.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.