THE South Wales Premier League only saw one contest completed on its opening day, but that has still ensured Newport face a trip to face the early league leaders.

Michael Clayden’s side will visit Pontarddulais tomorrow, having seen their opening weekend clash at Spytty Park last weekend washed out.

However, Pontarddulais were the only side able to complete their opening day fixture and they won it, edging out Ynysgerwyn by four runs to secure an away day victory.

That is exactly what Newport will now attempt to do as they travel west and skipper Michael Clayden insists his side are in good form and spirit.

They were undefeated in the off season, beating Wales U17 and Blackwood along the way as three of Newport’s top six in the batting order, including Clayden, scored centuries.

However, Clayden admits he won’t necessarily bat if his side win the toss tomorrow.

“Pontarddulais is actually a strange place to go in terms of the pitch, it can be very unpredictable,” he said.

“It can be a 180 wicket where you’ll do well to get that, or it is one where on a different day you could successfully chase down 240.

“So we won’t know until we have a good look.”

Clayden is confident about the campaign ahead, with Newport once again featuring a young looking squad. The club are extremely proud of their youth set-up and have generally done well in recent years in producing talent for the first XI.

“It’s a pretty young side again, but we feel we have good depth this season,” the skipper commented.

“We’ve got plenty of talent coming through and some are involved with the Wales set-up, so they’ll always get given a chance with us.”

Newport will travel without batsman Greg Maybury; he’s set to do his university finals and needs the time for studying. However, Glamorgan’s Andrew Salter is stood-by to replace him.

Clayden, himself a key feature for the Welsh Minor Counties side, is tipping one of his young stars to have a big season.

“Scott Thornton is a bit of an all-rounder, he could bat anywhere from four to six for us and we’d like to get him some runs,” he said.

“That will help his bowling as well, because he’s an exciting prospect.”

In Division Two, Panteg return to Gwent to entertain Carmarthen Wanderers.

And just as with Newport, Panteg will meet a side in a rich vein of form after Carmarthen (202-7) beat Tondu by 73 runs on the opening day, while Ian Bird’s men did well to eventually draw with Ynystawe, clinging on at 226-8 chasing an improbably 253-4 from the hosts.

Skipper Ian Bird wasn’t too disheartened to only draw on the opening day.

“We didn’t bowl well enough, our bowlers know that, we were chasing too high a total,” he said.

“However, we gave it a really good go with the bat, we actually looked for a while with Jamie Reid (73) and Adam Harrison (33) going along at nine an over like we were going to win, but then Adam got out.

“But we came out of the game with nine points on a day where most of the division didn’t get to play due to the weather, so it’s a happy start for us.”