The two Bathurst sides look set to be in next weekend’s first grade semi-finals but their focus in two days will be this 50-over-a-side affair at the Bathurst Sports-ground.

Neither side have had much to gloat about in recent times although Redbacks made the 2005/06 Bathurst Orange Inter District Cricket grand final and ran third last season.

ORC’s last major title was the 1999/2000 BOIDC crown while the Redbacks have never won a first grade title of any sort, although the club did take out last season’s inaugural Bathurst Twenty20 cup crown.

Redbacks skipper Matt Willis will have a plethora of bowling options with the in-form Craig Hanrahan, Mitch Sweeney, Matt Stevens, newcomer Matt Fennell, Kel Cooke and Percy Raveneau all front-line seamers.

The skipper may have to bowl his slow-medium pacers at some stage to stay up with the over-rate and those seven bowlers do not include Ben Orme and Jay Cleary, who are both more than handy with ball.

“It probably suits them [ORC] more than us [50-overs-a-side],” Willis said.

“I think we’ve got the bowlers to knock them over, it’s a good attack. But ORC have a lot of players in their top order who can occupy the crease ... you can get a few cheaper wickets when they are attacking.”

Both captains stressed how big this game is to their respective clubs.

“It matters a lot ... it’s been a long time since the club has been in a game like this,” Dennis said.

“I think it is [as important as the regular two-day final] ... we were good enough to get there and it’s an important game.”

Willis offered: “It’s a grand final ... anything you go in you want to win. It’s a big thing for the club to be in a game like this. It’s as big [as the two-day grand final].”

The match will start at 11am.

The first session runs from 11am to 2.15pm with the second session of play from 3pm to 6.15pm.