DRAKES League champions Honley expect to have John Greaves back this summer but will not be springing any major signing surprises on their title rivals.

Having won the Premiership last season with a record points haul of 125 – five more than the previous record held by Scholes from the previous season – the Byrom Shield holders will be fielding pretty much the same side.

That means a second season for last year’s League prize-winning batsman Max Joice, who topped 1,000 runs, along with his club’s prolific run-scorer Simon Kelly (the highest Huddersfield-born runmaker last year with an amazing 1,468).

Then there’s the League’s prize-winning bowler, Tom Craddock, who also scooped the Reg Haigh Trophy as the League’s leading young cricketer, having taken 79 wickets.

Greaves, who chose to take a ‘year out’ in 2010, has indicated his desire to get back into action.

“Jonny has made himself available for selection for one of the days on a weekend double header, and the likelihood is that he will play on a day that Mike Fraine doesn’t, and vice versa,” said captain Rob Moore, who this summer will be chasing an incredible sixth League title in seven seasons.

“It certainly looks like being a tight league again with several clubs having strengthened considerably, such as Hoylandswaine, Kirkburton and Shepley, who pushed us so hard all the way last season.

“Obviously it’s all about playing well consistently, but it also helps when you have been in that situation before, and when it comes to winning titles, we’ve got the advantage of having been there and done it. Last season we began well and we never looked back.

“However, we are normally notoriously slow starters – for whatever reason but it’s not for lack of preparation – and this season we have been handed an extremely tough opening set, with Hoylandswaine, Shepley and Delph & Dobcross, all away in the first four games!”

One of the things that Moore has tried to engender at Honley is the same sort of ethos that is more usually found at rugby union clubs, maybe because of his involvement as a younger man at Huddersfield RU, where he had a spell playing at hooker or scrum half under the guidance of coaches Mark Birch and Dick Auckland.

“On the whole, rugby teams play for each other and look after each other both on and off the field and that is the sort of spirit I’ve tried to instil here at Honley,” he said.

“When we recruit players, I want them to come to Honley because they really want to play at Honley. It is a good club, a nice place to play cricket, and a lot of people will stay behind after games, which all goes to creating a good atmosphere.

“We are not planning on an overseas player again this year, which will be the third season in succession we won’t have had one.

“It’s always a gamble getting an overseas player. They need time to settle in and get used to our conditions, and just because they gets wickets or runs back home in Australia, New Zealand or wherever, it doesn’t necessarily follow they will do it here.”

“I do realise that some of us are not getting any younger, and my long-term aim is to try and keep the club as one of the top sides in the area. To do that we need to recruit wisely and hopefully bring in local lads who want to play for Honley.”