Long-time friends Dennis Musson and Kijuan Franks will put that friendship aside when holders Cleveland County face Flatts in the first round of the Eastern Counties on Saturday at Sea Breeze Oval.

Sponsored again by Digicel & BTC, the series was launched yesterday with captains from the clubs in attendance at the Digicel office, including Musson, the returning captain of Cleveland and Franks who is in his second year back as captain of Flatts.

Cleveland won the cup two years ago at Sea Breeze Oval but face a tough challenge in the three-match series as they will be without three key players from last season. Captain Allan Douglas Jr and Treadwell Gibbons Jr are ineligible under Eastern Counties rules after leaving Cleveland to join St David’s and Western Stars in the league, while Jason Anderson is banned from cricket.

“Losing Allan, Treadwell and Jason is a big blow to us,” admits Musson, who replaced Douglas as captain.

“Nobody expected us to win the trophy when we did anyway, but we’re looking forward to this challenge. We know it’s going to be a daunting challenge, starting off with Flatts, and we’re not taking anybody lightly. I accepted [the captaincy] right away, Cleveland is the Devil’s Hole community where I’m born and raised and I back Cleveland to the fullest. I play with my heart.”

Flatts, the underdogs, view this is as a good opportunity to get their hands on the trophy and to set up a second-round meeting with St David’s on August 13.

“We’ve had a good season so far and hope to continue that form into this weekend,” said Franks, who is hoping to lead Flatts to promotion from the First Division.

“Everybody’s been putting in the work and now we just have to go out there and do what we have to do. It’s going to take for us to put our best game out there. I guess you can say there is a little more hype because we’re playing Cleveland but the buzz is always big come county time.”

St David’s will be waiting to learn who their second-round opponents will be, before host club Bailey’s Bay take on the eventual winners in the final on August 27.

“The main thing for us right now, after what we’ve been through, is to play in memory of Fiqre [Crockwell],” said OJ Pitcher, the captain of St David’s who take their unbeaten record to Sea Breeze Oval on Sunday for another top-of-the-table clash with Bay.

“We don’t know if we’re playing Cleveland or Flatts, but once we know we’ll start strategising.”

St David’s lost the Eastern Counties Cup to Cleveland at Sea Breeze Oval in 2014, so revenge will no doubt be on their mind if the present holders advance to the second round.

“It would be nice to be able to play Cleveland and to get it back from them as they were the ones who took it from us. No matter who we play, we’re coming out guns blazing.”

Bay, too, will be confident of succeeding where they failed last season, after controversy in their first-round match with Cleveland at Lord’s denied them victory.

“It’s a bit down the road, six weeks, but hopefully the cup will go around,” said Irving Romaine, the Bay coach. “Bailey’s Bay are at home and we’ll take our chances with that.”

Bay will have bowlers Malachi Jones and Zeko Burgess eligible to make their debuts in the competition.

The Eastern Counties Association have put measures in place to ensure there is not a repeat of that incident that marred last season’s series when Cleveland used delaying tactics as Bay closed in on victory.

Stumps were pulled at the designated cut off time of 7.20pm, just moments after Bay drew level with Cleveland’s score of 127. Time wasted during Cleveland protests over umpiring decisions was not taken into consideration. Shaki Darrell of Cleveland, was banned for 14 games.

“Under the chairmanship of my vice-president Lt Edward Lamb, the cricket committee reviewed the regulations and the code of conduct and had a close to two-hour meeting on Monday night with the clubs to go over the new regulations and code of conduct,” Steven Douglas, the ECCA president, said.