Saints have been drawn in a tough Pool A for their tournament, and the VKB Knights representatives will be up against the three-time champions, St Stithians of the Highveld Lions on Friday morning.

On Friday afternoon will be another tough outing for the Bloemfontein school, when they take on the Cape Cobras representative, Paarl Gymnasium.

On Saturday morning Saints will face the coastal focus school, High School Hudson Park, from East London in their final pool game, before the cross-pool matches’ start in the afternoon.

Numerous of the Saints players featured in the tournament last year, and this will help quite a lot, as they have a better understanding of the conditions, and because they are the only team who played in the tournament a year ago.

The Saints coach, Greg Hobson, told OFM Sport that his team is in high spirits.

The mood in the camp is really good. The guys energy levels and the intensity in training has been really good this week, so hopefully that translates into the way we play over the weekend.

“We are pretty much at full strength at the moment, and the only guys who didn’t travel with us, is Phillip Schoeman, and this is because he has a fractured thumb.

“In terms of the conditions, we did play there last year, so we do have some idea of that it will be like.

“Having said that, with the format and the different teams this year we don’t know what is going to happen.

“We can’t really have any expectations apart from expecting the guys to play their best possible cricket, and hope that it goes well from there.”

Pool B consists of Saint Andrews’ College in Grahamstown, St Charles College, Hoërskool Waterkloof and Queen’s College.

Saints 1st XI – Reeza Alexander, Rikus Allen, JD Bruwer, Ruan Cronjé, Jayden Davids, Henré Koekemoer, Pheko Moletsane, Zander Rasmussen, Naleli Sekhibane, Nathan van der Nest, Reece van Staden, Corné Viljoen, Tristan Wylie,

Head coach - Gregg Hobson, Assistant coach – Ryan du Plessis

Saints Pool A Fixtures

Friday, 15 March

9:30 - Saint Andrew's vs. Saint Stithian's, Tuks D,

14:15 - Saint Andrew's vs. Hudson Park, Tuks E,

Saturday, 16 March

9:30 - Saint Andrew's vs. Paarl Gimnasium, Tuks B, 09:30.

@MorganPiek OFM Sport