Who's who in Singapore cricket

The Singapore Cricket Association season has started. Dinesh Chelvathurai profiles each team:

The Singapore League season commenced recently and there are seven teams competing for the Division One title.

The league which got underway in March will stretch until September in this 50 over tournament played on Sundays. A brief profile of each team is as follows:

The Singapore Cricket Club (SCC 1) are the reigning champs and are strongly fancied to retain the title. The team will be led by Zubin Shroff who emerged as one of the leading batsmen last year. SCC I has a strong batting line up with A.Vijay, Daniel Hayward, former national coach Grant Stanley and wicket-keeper batsman N.Balasubramaniam providing the support to skipper Shroff.

The bowling attack will be spearheaded by paceman Saurabh Mahajan while the spin attack of veterans Stacey Muruthi and Grant Stanley is bound to cause problems to all the teams.

Indian Association (IA) who were narrowly lost the title by a mere point to SCC in 1999 will once again be led by allrounder Sunder Mani.

IA will rely on skipper Sunder Mani, Kiran Deshpande, Kuldeep Varma, Sandeep Seth, Harish Dongre and wicket-keeper batsmen V.Jeyaraman for a big total while the bowling strength lies in the four pronged spin attack consisting of left armer Kiran Deshpande, leg spinner Sandeep Seth and off spinners Sunder Mani and K.Suresh.

Singapore Recreation Club (SRC) has potentially the strongest team and likely to pose the biggest threat to the reigning champions SCC I. The team will be led by former Malaysian national player Steven Bell who has a talented pool of young players to call upon.

The batting line up looks powerful with the experience of Bell, Kapila Mendis, and Sandeep Puri providing the ideal foil for the youthful talent of Aravind Srinivasan, Avinash Abraham and Suneth Mendis.

Pakistani Shazib Pervaiz who had an excellent season with the ball in 1999 will once again share the new ball with David Woolforde with Avinash Abraham for back up. Malaysian off-spinner Cheong and left arm spinner Aravind Srinivasan will provide the variety to the attack.

United World College (UWC) will once again have the services of skipper Gary Higgie and much will rest on the shoulders of batsmen York Spencer, Don McGowan and David Ng. UWC's strength lies in their bowling attack comprising pacemen John McGowan and Gary Higgie who will be supported by the spinners Andrew Creevey and Matthew Cox.

Ceylon Sports Club (CSC) will rely on their experienced trio of allrounders skipper Sarika Prasad, Dinesh Chelvathurai and T.Ravichandran if they are to make an impact this season. The batting is strengthened by the addition of Malaysian wicket keeper batsman Suresh Sakadivan while it is hoped that the talented N.Anand will realise his potential. The new ball will be shared by S.Sritharan and Razi Zayeed with Ravichandran for support while spin department will comprise of left armer Sarika Prasad and off spinner Dinesh Chelvathurai.

The Singapore Cricket Association Colts (SCA Colts) will be led by national captain Johann Pieris who will add much needed experience to his young team.

The Colts will also have the services of coach Goh Swee Heng and these two senior players will be expected to score heavily. Much is also expected from 16 year old Zeng Rengchun who is currently the national wicket keeper.

The bowling attack looks strong with the pace attack of Rishi Kaul and Manbhir Singh supplemented by the leg-spin of Ivan Then and S. Mainuddin as well as the off spin of Riaz Hussein.

Singapore Cricket Club will be fielding two teams in Division I having won Division 2 in 1999 and gaining promotion. SCC II will be led by Richard Holloway and the skipper will rely on the experienced campaigners such as Keith Martens, Mark Bowden, David Whiting and James Grant-Weatherall if they are make their presence felt in the higher echelons.