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Bit strong Paul. Five year bans and fines. You must be a footballer?
Having read the explanations you may wish to say.............oops!

Andy, it's that royal 'we' that you put in your emails that makes us website correspondents think you are speaking on behalf of the club. If it's you and the wife that's OK.
Now that Lisburn and North Down have clarified their positions maybe we can get on our buses and head to Twenty20 action where hopefully there'll be no gib about the hosts. They deserve medals for taking on such a bunch of ungrateful critics in the midst of some genuine supporters. Love of the game? Sorry Ivan, times have changed.

Re Junior Cup Final
North Down regrettably informed the Union on June 18 that due to unforeseen circumstances, we would not be able to host the NCU Junior Cup final as previously agreed. It was with respect to the importance of the competition that this decision was made.
Our groundsman of many years informed us at the beginning of May that his services would no longer be available and despite an extensive search, at the time no replacement had been found.
We felt that since we might not be able to supply a pitch and ground at our normal high standard, it would be best not to let ourselves and the competition down by hosting the fixture in these circumstances.
This position changed in the second week in July when we were able to appoint a temporary groundsman for the remainder of the season.

Andy/Michael - thanks, think we can leave it there. Andy, your explanation would in many ways simply reemphasise what my general point was, that being how other people can jump to wrong conclusions when not in full possession of all of the facts.

PS Michael K: Michael Patterson, who may be living or working in Lisburn, is not a club member or (to the best of my knowledge) a club supporter. Just thought I would clear that up in case forumites took him as a Lisburn CC spokesperson.

re Michael's posting about Muckamore not hosting an interpro - if I recall correctly -and I'm open to correction -this game was moved to facilitate a re-arranged game between Muckamore and Downpatrick - something that we had no control over so Ryan's problem in looking for a ground was not iniatiated by Muckamore.

Michael Patterson.

Will need to look into the Inter Pro not being hosted by us. There must be a good reason behind it. But well done for stepping into the breach. Sounds a bit like Moylena hosting the Ireland A match last season after a certain premier league ground was "unplayable".

But I think we can all put the JC issue to bed, you have fully justified your position in my opinion. I just hope we learn the lesson for next year.

Lets look forward to the Twenty 20 action this weekend. The Muckamore supporters bus is full and we intend to enjoy ourselves. Are any other clubs willing to join us?

thanks to Michael Foster for that very full and lucid explanation.
The opinions that I put express are personal and in no way should they be construed as being the "official" Muckamore view.
I am not close enough to the decision-making process to give any explanation about the inter-pro - I'll leave that to others.

Andy - lets put this JC Final stuff to bed.

Lisburn was asked to host the JC Final after ND pulled out, for whatever reason. There is more than a little history behind this, which might aid you, and hopefully will allow you to move on to something else.

Our patron, Cecil Walker, is a huge fan of the competition. As you know, we have hosted it many times in the past. Last season we experienced a few difficulties on the day - horrendous weather beforehand being the chief problem. One of the teams involved, we are led to believe, allegedly complained to the NCU about our ability to host a final of this nature. I wont say which one, but lets just say there is more than a hint of irony involved. The net result was that we applied to host the final again, but were unsuccessful. Cecil was extremely hurt by this decision, but is much too dignified a gentleman to have caused any subsequent bother.

The NCU asked us to consider taking it again after ND's decision. Cecil put the earlier issues behind him and was, initially, delighted at the prospect of hosting the game. However, as a club, we agreed to consider the request, we never agreed to actually host the match, officially, unofficially, whatever phrase Andy suits.

It was others in the club who pointed out to Cecil and the committee that the 2nd XI were in big trouble in 2.1. One win out of only 4 matches played, bottom of the league, horrendous fixture pile up. Cecil's initial desire to host the game was tempered by the fact that a home fixture against Ballymena would require rearrangement, no doubt for a Friday, another one with 3 already rescheduled for the 2nds.

With the holiday period, our committee werent all about, but while some members of the club may well have thought we had agreed to take the game, this was never actually decided. After approx 10 days, we concluded that it was not in the club's best interests on this occasion to accept the offer to host the game. We let the NCU know accordingly.

Two further points: if we had been the original hosts of the match you can rest assured we would have hosted the game, no matter what the circumstances of the 2nd XI.

Secondly, Lisburn has already stepped in to help at short notice this season in taking a fixture that another club has "reneged" on, for want of a better description. It was the NCU -v- North West U17 interpro game held in late May, where Ryan Eagleson was frantically trying to find an alternative after the original club let him down. We accepted, at very short notice, and hosted a great game, on a fine wicket, with a superb tea, and received glowing praise from all involved. And the original venue of that game???????? More irony indeed, and perhaps our two Muckamore men Andy and Ivan can provide readers with the answer, but just for a clue it begins with M and ends with A.

Re Ivan C, Michael P and Andy K.

Ivan, Andy
I can understand how Michael P feels. Take the example of the Schools Cup Final at Muckamore this year. There was a lot of effort put into us hosting that day, and the reports in the papers and on the web were mostly about an uneven pitch. Yes it was a big thing for us to host it and it is indeed an honour (and always will be), but it's not fair to revieve knocks like we did.

On the hosting of finals....North Down should hang their heads in shame about the Junior Cup! I understand that at the beginning of the season, at registration time, clubs are asked if they would be interested in having their hat in the ring to host a final? If this is the case, surely the NCU should decide at the beginning of the year where each final will be and ban / fine the host clubs if they pull out at a later date! By ban, I mean dont allow them to host another final or representative match for 5 years. As Ivan says, it should be a privilege to host a game. I understand Lisburn's situ though as they were asked at the last mo, but surely North Down have no excuse!

re Michael Patterson - what? me? stir the pot? surely not! totally agree with Ivan. I think that there's more behind this than is appearing on forums - Can I take it from the official Lisburn posting on another forum that there was NEVER any indication - official or otherwise that the Junior Cup final was to be at Wallace Park??
Belfast Parks grounds? Only 2 - Danny Blanchflower & Mallusk - another sign of the decline of club cricket in the Belfast area - in the past we had Inverary Ave., Cherryvale, Musgrave, etc. Demand and supply?

Michael, believe or believe it not but the " for the good of the game " ethos still exists." Mr Muckamore" John McCormick has drummed that into all of us at Muckamore. Without that ethos the game just can't survive. If all clubs start putting themselves first all of the time where will cup finals be played ? Belfast Park pitches. Hosting a cup final should be seen as an honour and an opportunity to "sell " your club to the wider cricketing faternity. On another point would the Junior Cup final be an even more special occassion if it was to be played on a Friday? It's not that long ago we hosted a two day final between Academy and Woodvale 2nds and my memory says the Friday was the best attended day.

Andy, I think you are mischievously stirring the pot on hosting cup finals because most clubs who have done it now see such games as benevolence, hard work and with little appreciation by either union or players. Yes you'll get the traditional thank you but why would any club want to host a match and give up their ground and have their members work tirelessly for the benefit of others? What's the incentive? Don't come back with bar takings or love of the game. These competitions are sponsored and its time the union paid for hosting the games and stop taking most of the proceeds.

Here we go again with club versus country and Eoin Morgan's potential 'no show' for the Twenty20s.
He' in the mix for hundreds of thousands of pounds and dollars with Middlesex and some people are getting antsy about playing for Ireland. Let's get real there's nobody in Ireland going to turn down a pot of gold in these circumstances. Nobody.
Morgan is hoping to play for England and his days in a green sweater have been numbered for some time. Let's wish him luck and move on. He deserves all he gets.

i would just like to remind people that the festival of cricket involving the air india team begins on wednesday with a game against Canada at 4.30 and continues on thursday with a fixture against bermuda at the same time. Although the squad isnt known yet, there will be several players who played in the IPL.