Armagh V Lisburn 31/05/09

Armagh’s reward for beating Muckamore in the first round of the TCH Newry and Down Democrat sponsored Challenge Cup was a  daunting home tie against Premier League pacesetters Lisburn. It took a tremendous effort from a sizeable volunteer workforce to have the Mall playable for the Cup tie as the fantastic weather dried up the previously sodden ground at an unbelieveable rate. It was a very different Armagh side than the one which defeated Donacloney with several of that team unavailable for varying reasons, in particular club captain CP Kulkarni being ineligible for the cup competition so vice-captain Gareth McCarter stepped in and was understandably delighted to win the toss and bat first. Unfortunately Armagh’s depleted side didn’t help their cause with a series of poor shots against a disciplined if unspectacular Lisburn side. It was only Harry Doyle and Ryan McCarter who showed any real application at the crease and saved Armagh from an embarrassingly low score with a intelligent partnership. Indeed the younger Doyle played some nice strokes as he ended up 26 not out at the innings close as the tail subsided around him. Lisburn’s Ryan Ervine claimed 3-17 which was enough to claim the Man of the Match prize as Armagh’s 61 all out did little to suggest a cup shock was on the cards.

The only shock that followed was the severity of the Lisburn assault on the Armagh bowling as they reached 65 for the loss of no wickets in less than 8 overs with everyone being harshly dealt with, but given the class of the Lisburn batting and the comparative league standing of the two sides then perhaps a wide margin was to be expected and was indeed the case in all of the second round cup ties.

Captain Gareth McCarter admitted that he was relieved to win the toss and get batting first, but conceded that he was disappointed with the manner of the Armagh dismissals throughout the innings. “When we face better bowling we need  to get into a habit of playing straight and picking the right delivery to score off, unfortunately today against high class opponents we chose some dreadful strokes, myself included. Harry Doyle showed that with a bit of patience and good application that runs would come, but nobody other than Ryan hung around to support him. We enjoyed the cup run though and some young players learned a bit about the standard we need to get to. Lisburn are a top class side and will feature heavily in league and cup so we shouldn’t beat ourselves up too much about it, but rather look to learn from it and move on.”

Armagh lost to Lisburn by 10 wickets.

The Mall, 31 May.

Armagh 61 (35.3 overs, H Doyle 26* R Ervine 3-17)

Lisburn 65-0 (7.5 overs, C Ervine 39*)

This weekend Armagh return to Ulster Bank League action with a Saturday home fixture against Academy. Charu Kulkarni will of course return to captain the side and hopefully Colin Russell will have returned from a nasty ankle injury to bolster the batting line-up. The second XI are also at home in an Intermediate Cup tie against Instonians while the 4th XI travel to Muckamore. Both games on the Mall start at 1pm.