Rugby players hope to make mark

Shropshire players will look to make their mark as the North Midlands go for glory in tomorrow's County Championship Shield promotion decider against Cheshire at Macclesfield.

Victories over Cumbria and Leicestershire have given the North Mids a real chance of sealing promotion to the Bill Beaumont Cup, the top flight of the County Championship, next season.

Should they win, they will also progress to the final at Twickenham on Saturday, May 30 where they will play the winners of the South group.

So there is plenty of incentive for the team that includes Newport centre James Curgenven and lock Chris Taylor and Worcester Academy and Newport hooker Sam Lewis.

Luctonians duo, fly half Alex James and prop Rob Yeomans, are also named in the starting line-up while Anthony Marfell (Luctonians), Matt Curgenven (Newport) and Chris Tennuci (Shrewsbury) are on the replacements bench.

North Midlands head coach Alan Hubbleday believes his side can prosper, and is more than happy that they are going into the showdown as underdogs.

Both sides are unbeaten after two rounds of group matches and the winners of tomorrow's game will go through to the final at Twickenham.

Hubbleday, a former England Schools team-mate of Jonny Wilkinson, believes that with home advantage Cheshire will start as favourites, but he is comfortable with that situation.

"We will be underdogs because we are playing away and also because of the players with National Leagues experience that Cheshire have in their squad," said the former Moseley and Birmingham & Solihull hooker.

"Cheshire will be favourites to win but we quite like the fact that we will be going there as underdogs.

"Our line-out has been pretty good so far this season, but we have struggled a bit at scrum time so we have not had the right platform," said Hubbleday.