DORCHESTER captain Martyn Richards believes Suttoners will be the main challengers in their bid to retain the Dorset Premier League crown.

The county town side captured last year’s league title just 12 months after gaining promotion from Division One.

Richards, whose men visit Wimborne & Colehill in Saturday’s curtain-raiser, expects to see both Poole and Broadstone improve on last summer’s show but insists that Suttoners will be “the ones to beat”.

He said: “Poole and Broadstone are always up there and I think they’ll be stronger than last year. But I think it’s clear that Suttoners will be the ones to beat this time as they’ve got Darren Cowley playing for them as well as Grant Mather.

“Matt Tatchell has joined them this year and he’s a fantastic all-rounder so I expect Suttoners to score a lot of runs and take a lot of wickets.”

Richards is also looking forward to renewing acquaintances with rivals Weymouth, adding: “We had a tremendous game against them at the Rec last year and we were delighted to win that game. Hopefully this year though, we will get in two games against them after one of last year’s fixtures was rained off.

“There’s always an edge to the games against Weymouth and I’m sure they’ll want to get one over on us.”

Dorchester (97 all out) suffered defeat in their one and only pre-season friendly, losing to league rivals Poole (174-6) by 77 runs.

But Richards, who snared 2-35 in the clash, is confident his players will be ready when the season gets underway this weekend.

He said: “With a previous friendly against Street being called off we haven’t had a great deal of preparation but the boys have trained hard, made good use of the net facilities and are all raring to go.

“People want to play against us for different reasons this year. Last season people thought we’d be the whipping boys but we surprised everyone.

“And after winning it last year everyone will want to beat us.

“Unfortunately we didn’t win at Poole but we did get a good workout. James Dunham (1-30) and Joe Power (2-36) both bowled superbly while Nick Roe kept wicket brilliantly, the highlight being a fantastic stumping. It was pleasing to see the younger players do well.

“Lee Haynes (13), Paul Tweddle (29) and Ian Sibley (17) then got some good time at the crease, which is important ahead of our first league match on Saturday.”