With a squad that is twice as experienced as that of their hosts, St. George's will make the trek to Somerset tomorrow morning for the 95th Cup Match confident that the oldest trophy in local sports will be in safe hands. The hands that will be trusted with the cup are those of rookie captain and vice captain Clay Smith and Dean Minors. But in case Somerset think that inexperience will give them an edge they need only consider the vast knowledge that the pair can call on. For a start there are former captains Wendell Smith and Clevie Wade, both of whom had victories in Somerset, and veteran batsman Charlie Marshall. The trio between them have 49 appearances in Cup Match, 10 more than the entire Somerset team put together. Captain Clay admits that brother Wendell hasn't been free with his advice, preferring to let him make his own decisions. "He doesn't want it to seem like he's dictating things from the top so he's let me go ahead and be the skipper and then if I come to him for advice he'll give me advice,'' said Clay. Smith admits it is a challenge following in the footsteps of Wendell and captain of the last three years, Graham Fox, who led the team to a successful victory the last time the match was at Somerset. "Wendell and Graham, both of them have been very successful and my job is to keep the trend going, not to compete with those two. It's not about `I want to win more than Graham Fox or Wendell Smith' but a matter of putting your best foot forward.'' There have been two developments in Cup Match in the last couple of years in a bid to end the sequence of draws, with the year-about going into effect last year and now an extra hour will be added to each day. The onus is still on the captains to to play exciting cricket and take changes. Somerset have not won since 1982, the year before they lost the cup to Clevie Wade's team. Smith insists it will be a few more years before the challengers win again. "St. George's have too strong a team for Somerset to bowl us out twice,'' Smith feels. "I can't see Somerset winning the trophy for another 10 years because of the nucleus of players that we have. "That was one thing that I emphasised with the selectors, that with Lionel Cann, Glenn Smith, Dean, myself and Gregg, I wanted this five in particular because this is going to be the nucleus of our team the next 10 years. "You want to groom these guys and get them as much exposure as possible while the Charlies and Clevies are still here, so that when they go out of the game these guys will be the senior players to the new guys coming in.'' In Dexter Smith's absence Glenn Smith will open the innings with Wendell Smith, the leading scorer in the history of Cup Match, having passed 1,000 runs last year. "Looking at the first seven it would probably be Wendell and Glenn, myself, Charlie, Clevie, Dean, Lionel,'' revealed the captain. "We have a lot of stroke players but we still have a mixture of guys who can graft. We have Eugene Foggo in case we do get into trouble. He can hold one end while the other batsman goes ahead and scores the runs.'' In the past few years the captains have been blamed for not going for victories, but the fact that St. George's dropped a top order batsman for a bowler should serve to show how serious they are about going for a victory. "That would have been the other alternative, to take the extra batsmen, but as people are screaming out for victories we picked a team that is capable of winning the cup,'' Smith stressed. "If we didn't have the cup and were trying to win it then this would be an excellent team to try to win the cup. We're trying to give the people what they want.'' Asked to assess the strength of his opponents, Smith, already in his ninth Cup Match, replies: "I think they have a strong side but I feel they are a little top heavy with the batting. I look at Corey (Hill) and Janeiro (Tucker) as being all-rounders so they've left themselves open with just Roger Blades as their genuine quickie. "Normally Somerset have a grassy strip and I would have felt they would have taken another specialist opening bowler and that way have the two pacers and the two seamers with the two spinners which would have given them more variety.'' Whoever bats first Smith expects the fans to be treated to some early excitement, be it Glenn Smith's strokeplay at the top of the order or his own bowlers getting an early breakthrough. "I can see Clarkie and Gregg causing some early problems up there because the wicket is going to be grassy and these guys are excellent seam bowlers....even with Lionel (Cann) and Clevie (Wade),'' Smith says.

"All in all I think the game is going to be won on the second day, most likely with us having to chase after their score like we did last time up there. I think we'll be successful at doing it again. "If we don't bowl them out the second day then they are going to have to make a declaration and whatever they have we'll go after.'' If it comes down to a run chase by St. George's they have, like they showed in '94, the depth in their batting to take up the task, with batsmen late in the order capable of swinging the bat, like wicket-keeper Dean Minors and allrounders Lionel Cann and Clarkie Trott.

THE TEAMS (with debut year, appearances in brackets:) ST. GEORGE'S Clay Smith (1987, 8) Dean Minors (1988, 5) Wendell Smith (1976, 18) Clevie Wade (1977, 17) Charlie Marshall (1980, 14) David Adams (1986, 7) Eugene Foggo (1988, 5) Lionel Cann (1993, 3) Glenn Smith (1991, 2) Clarkie Trott (1990, 2) Gregg Foggo (colt).

SOMERSET Dexter Basden (1988, 7) Albert Steede (1989, 7) Andre Manders (1982, 13) Roger Trott (1985, 2) Jeff Richardson (1992, 4) Hasan Durham (1994, 2) Roger Blades (1994, 2) Kevin Fubler (1995,1) Janeiro Tucker (1992, 1) Corey Hill (colt) Treadwell Gibbons (colt).

Umpires: Dennis Raynor, Randy Butler.

CONFIDENT -- St. George's captain Clay Smith is confident he will be holding the Cup Match trophy like this on Friday evening. This is the MVP trophy he won after the 1994 match.