St Albans are looking forward to the new club cricket season in Christchurch with more than a little interest.

The side is being captained and coached by Darron Reekers, fresh from a successful season in club cricket in the Netherlands. His achievement there of scoring more than 900 runs and taking over 20 wickets resulted in him being included as the overseas professional in the English Cheltenham and Gloucester knockout trophy.

A qualified level II coach he will coach an enlarged first and second grade squad.

The senior side, at its peak, could field seven players with first-class experience including internationals Chris Harris and Chris Martin.

Harris is likely to have one of his longest stints with the club in recent years before the onset of the first-class programme in New Zealand.

Six of the senior squad, Harris, Martin, Stephen Cunis, Jarrod Englefield, Reekers and James Ward, have been involved in Canterbury's winter training squad while the seventh player with first-class experience is this year's professional player Ian Blanchett who has played for Middlesex.

Two others, Neil Fletcher and Murray Griffin, have played A cricket for Auckland and Otago respectively. Also in the squad are two of last summer's Canterbury under-19 representatives, Nigel Tubb and Michael Davison.

Rounding out the squad is former Taranaki Hawke Cup player, Keith Muller, a wicket-keeper/batsman who is a Canterbury Cricket-Lincoln University scholarship holder. He will have his first full season in Christchurch after the completion of his university exams in late-October.

New Zealand's cancellation of its tour to Pakistan could see Martin available for the first round of club play this weekend.

The likely involvement of Cunis and Englefield as certainties in the Canterbury team, with possibly Reekers and Ward alongside them, could hit the club hard, however the ability available in the second side should be a boost. Three second grade players from last year will be back at the end of the university year in Otago while three overseas amateurs will also be playing for the club, one of them having played under-20 cricket for Worcestershire.

The strength of the first grade side is reminiscent of the team from the club's "glory days" in the late-1980s and early-1990s, when the side won the two-day trophy title in six out of eight seasons (between 1985/86 and 1993/94). Back then, the side had no less than 11 players who had played or played first-class cricket during that reign of supremacy - Geoff Smith, Paul Rutledge, Mark Priest, Andrew Nuttall, Roger Ford, Max Bremner, Henry Richards, Richard Brazendale, Ben Harris, Chris Harris, and the club's West Indian professional of the time, Garfield Charles. Only Rhys Cain, Grant Lucas, Brett Harrison and captain Neil Francis had not or did not play first-class cricket.

With such a strong side now, and having won the two-day trophy competition last season, St Albans is confident of retaining its title in 2001/02. The side is especially keen to secure the one-day title, as this has eluded it for seven years.

© CricInfo