In an extended weekend, I managed to get to all or part of seven matches! Friday was the reserve day for the Bob Kerr Irish Senior Cup, on which Old Belvedere were due to travel to Woodvale and Cork County to YMCA.

There was no possibility of play at Woodvale, so the NCU team offered Old Belvedere a tele-bowl-out. Woodvale assembled at their club under Paddy O'Hara's supervision, and Belvo (the full team fully togged out) at Cabra under mine. After we had measured up and marked out a crease in the nets, Woodvale, who had won the toss, bowled first.

Paddy informed me that Robinson had missed, and I then watched Sandy Chahal push one past leg stump. Over came the news that Brown too had missed, and there were loud cheers at Cabra as Monty Singh hit. Now I got the message that Burnside had missed, and I was able to tell Paddy that Yogesh had hit.

More loud cheers were followed by jubilation as I gave them the news that Woodvale's fourth bowler had missed and that Belvo were through 2-0. It was all very surreal, a bit like the mimed tennis match in the film Blow Up. But it did the job, and round to Sandymount I went through the Friday afternoon traffic.

There I found YMCA on 94-1 after 15 overs with Reinhardt Strydom on 48 batting with Alan Lewis on 30-odd. The Living Legend That Is Lewie then sold Rainy down the river, run out two short of a debut 50. While Rob Nandi got his head down, TLLTIL merrily passed fifty with some beefy drives.

TTLTIL then started to go aerial, surviving one difficult chance and a superb diving attempt at deep extra cover by Stephen Hickey. His ton was reached with a slog sweep for six towards the car park, which also brought up the century partnership. Nandi then nicked off for 30 in the 36th over with the score on 200.

Kamikaze man Ehtesham Ahmed (Shammy to his friends) helped TLLTIL add 35 more runs in four overs before Hickey hung onto a catch at deepish mid off to dismiss Lewis for 122. Next over Shammy ran himself out for 10 (Paddy Power had refused to lay odds against that one) with the score on 243.

YMCA then subsided to 259 all out in a further six over frenzy of bad batting and silly shots. For Cork County , Justin McQuirk returned a very creditable 2/26 off 8 overs, and Santos Kulkarni a respectable 0/42 off a full ten overs. The bowlers conceded only 13 wides, pretty good for May 1st.

Stephen Hickey and Ross Durity dug in against some decent bowling from Strydom and new Aussie pro James Parkinson, and made very slow progress before Durity was lbw to Strydom for 8. Hickey was bowled by Strydom for 21, and Kulkarni was lbw first ball.

Stu McCready had replaced Parkinson, and had Bannon caught behind and then Mirza Baig lbw first ball. Creedon nicked the hat-trick ball through the legs of TLLTIL standing at slip. I can't record the reply to the question coming from slip 'Did that carry?'

After stubborn resistance from Robert Duggan (15) and Oscar Creedon (16) took the score to 83, Parkinson returned to clean up the tail, Cork County being out for 101 in 36.3 overs, 21 of these coming from wides. Parkinson took 4/13 off his ten overs (4/3 from the last five), Strydom 3/23 off 9 and Stu McCready 2/24 off 7.

YMCA now travel on Saturday to Strabane for the first round proper, while Old Belvedere will be further up the road at Beech Grove to play Brigade. I got the chance to watch more of YMCA the next day as they started early at the Inch against North County .

James Parkinson and Paul Beacroft each put in a lively opening spell against left-handers Conor Armstrong and Mossie Shiel, but there was no reward (apart from Shammie spilling a nick from Conor off Parkinson) before I left for my chosen DGM match, Clontarf v Merrion.

I should have stayed in Balrothery, because 'Tarf, inserted by Merrion skipper Jeff Short, were dire. Adrian D'Arcy played all round one from Matt Petrie, one of the few deliveries the Aussie bowled that threatened the stumps. He was replaced at the Castle end by Richard Keaveney, who immediately had Niall Delany caught at gully by Damian Poder.

Bill Coghlan had clubbed a couple of fours, but with the score on 41 he had a leaden-footed waft at Gus Fleming and holed out to Jeff Short at mid on for 10. Rod Hokin poked around while 'Kiwi' went through the Clontarf soft underbelly. Richard Reid got an absolute snorter, which the Shoebomber could only nick to Ben Ackland behind the stumps.

Conor D'Arcy got two fewer runs than his brother, plumb lbw to Kiwi. Joe Morrissey left one from Fleming that pitched two feet outside his leg stump, but instead of collecting one run for the wide, he was sent packing by the death rattle behind him. Kiwi was far too quick and straight for Jordan Coghlan, Andrew Cole and Jack McGreal, helping himself to a Birmingham Six-for.

Rip van Winkle Hokin awoke from his torpor, boxed Kiwi for 14 runs off the first five balls of an over, but then ran out John Cotter trying to keep the strike. He was left on 25* out of a total of 80 in 23 overs, 31 of which were wides. Keaveney returned what must be a career-best 6/38, Fleming 2/21, and Petrie 1/16 (5 off the bat!).

Merrion didn't take long to put Clontarf out of their misery. Although Pradeep Laval miscued Jordan Coghlan to the Shoebomber at cover for 11, and John Anderson nicked off left-armer Cole for 9, 50/2 became 81/2 in 19.3 overs as Dom Joyce (35*) and Ben Ackland (15*) played some nice cricket shots.

That left me plenty of time to drive up to Rush, where I found Railway Union chasing 149 to win. Rush hadn't actually scored 148, but had erroneusly been allowed to bat beyond their allotted 2hours 45 minutes. A rummage through the regs at tea meant that to the score after 43 overs, when the time had run out, were added 2 x 6 runs, giving 148 to be exceeded in 41 overs to win.

Tom Fisher and Kenny Carroll got a move on after losing Sam Halfpenny early doors, and when Kenny was out for 30-odd, Conor Mullen kept the scoreboard moving. Fisher departed for 40, and Gareth Carroll scratched around for a brief while before being replaced by Mohammed Tariq.

Niall Mullen hadn't been having a great day – his late flurry of runs had been wiped out by the necessary adjustments to Rush's total, his one over had gone for 15 runs, and now he dropped a simple catch at square leg with forty runs still needed. Mo (26*) and Mully (41*) didn't look back, and Railway reached their target with nearly five overs to spare.

In an attempt to avoid delays around Croke Park I got stuck by delays at the Point (sorry, the O2). Never mind, the snooker wasn't very interesting when I did eventually get home. Sunday saw a trip to Sydney Parade to watch the third of the Irish Senior Cup preliminary round refixes, Pembroke v Killymallaght. The Derry team won the toss and elected to bat.

Overseas player Derek Bland looked good, and drove Alan Eastwood for two nice fours. I can't comment on Gareth McKeegan's batting – he lost his off stump to Bill Whaley's first ball. Chris Cooper played straight, and helped Bland to add 67 untroubled runs to take the score to 76-1 in the 25th over.

Graham McDonnell was bowling, fielded a forward push by Cooper and threw at the stumps. The ball wasn't going to hit the stumps, but it wasn't going to miss by much, and Cooper, standing out of his ground, caught it and threw it back to McDonnell. Pembroke's Aussie pro, Anthony Brooks, appealed, and after a conference between the umpires Pembroke skipper Emmett Whaley was called over.

Cooper continued to bat, so Whaley had sportingly withdrawn the appeal. Two balls later Cooper played forward, was hit on the pad, and after a loud appeal (this is Pembroke!) reluctantly departed for 18 at the sight of umpire Bristow's upraised finger.

That was the beginning of the end. Stephen Wallace was bowled by Brooks with the score on 88, and in Brooks's next over Bland reached 50 with a boundary, hit another, and appeared to lose concentration as he ran himself out for a beautifully compiled 54 out of 97. Darren Moore and Peter Allen added another 19 runs before each was out lbw.

Gregory McIvor and Dale Colbert each perished to Andrew Balbirnie one run later, before Alastair Dunn and Gary Mitchell briefly prospered on Stu McDonnell's attempts to pitch his leg breaks in the right place. On 135 Mitchell flapped a well-pitched leggie to Balbirnie at cover, and Balbirnie finished things off by bowling Kyle Moore in the 43rd over.

Most of the Pembroke bowlers' figures were tidy: Bill Whaley took 1/12 off 7; Graham McDonnell 1/16 off 7; Anthony Brooks 2/23 off 10; and Andrew Balbirnie 4/27 off 7.5 overs. There were 20 extras, including 12 wides, in Killymallaght's 135.

There were half a dozen overs before tea for Brian O'Rourke and Andrew Balbirnie to negotiate, which they did without incident. After a nice tea (the shortbread biscuits were really good), Balbirnie started putting bat to ball as various bowlers tried their luck. Shortly after reaching his fifty he perished to a well-judged catch at deep mid on by Bland off Cooper's bowling.

One Aussie pro was bowled by the other before Graham McDonnell (10*) made sure O'Rourke (47*) didn't reach fifty before Pembroke passed the Killymallaght total off the last ball of the 26th over. The Derry men also conceded 20 extras, 14 of them wides.

The early finish gave me the chance to get home and catch up on things, but during the afternoon a bouncy castle had been erected down by the nets, and the South African and Zimbabwean communities in Dublin had assembled for a football match and barbeque (sorry, braai). My Nissan was wedged into the corner of the car park by a host of crucial cars!

So there I sat in the bar for three hours making polite conversation to my fellow immigrants (Zim won 2-0), sipping Erdinger Alkoholfrei, listening to Killymallaght drowning their sorrows, until a space cleared around my car. Shades of Reggie Perrin: 'Sorry, dear, thirty minutes late, traffic cones at the Point.'; 'Really sorry, love, one hundred and eighty minutes late, Shona and Norn Iron in the bar, Xhosa in the car park.'

On Monday I drove back out to the Inch to watch North County play Phoenix . County were quickly in trouble, losing Conor Armstrong caught behind off a lifter from David Langford Smith and Mossie Shiel yorked by Andrew Downton. The 'doctor' can consider himself unlucky, as it was the only ball Jonty Wardell hung onto for the first hour and a half.

Ciaran Garry and Shane O'Connor hung in until the change bowlers appeared, and 'Blackie' in particulat tucked into Conor Kelly with a few big sixes. The score had reached 95 when Blackie O'Connor (45) miscued third change Sean Green (who's neither Irish green nor the green giant, but nearer to Green & Black's), another product of the Phoenix desk at Dublin Airport.

On 112, 'Mini' Garry was bowled by Green for 34, and Richie Lawrence came out to join Brian Shields. While Lawrence followed the motto festina lente, Shields went for carpe diem, but no sooner had he reached a classy 50 than he lost concentration and was bowled by Green with the score on 169.

Eddie Richardson crashed it around, scoring 16 of the next 20 runs before running himself out, then Dara Armstrong and Lawrence put on a rapid 30 before Dara skied Downton to Lanky. Finally Lawrence lobbed Flanagan to Dickieson at cover for a well-made 35, and Terry Richardson and Conor Shiel were bowled by Flanagan aiming at something other than the ball, all those wickets falling on 231.

Downton never got to bowl his last over, taking 2/30, Langford Smith took 1/24 off his 9, Rory Flanagan took 3/53 off 8 and Green 3/56 off 9. There were 24 extras, including 14 wides.

Phoenix lost Flanagan second ball, bowled off stump by Eddie Richardson as he played down the line of middle and leg. Paddy Conliffe joined Rob Mitchell, and the pair added 38 before Mitch was bowled by Conor Shiel for 13, when Aussie pro Downton came in. He hit one super six over backward square, but was out for 11 chipping a return catch to Conor Armstrong.

Conliffe was out for 27 on the same score, bowled by Shiel. When skipper Corie Dickieson was bowled by Armstrong for 12, Phoenix were 77-5 and going nowhere. The scoreboard ran out of hyphens when Langford Smith was joined by Matt Plunkett-Cole, and Lanky swiftly took the aerial route and got his side back in the picture with a rapid 34.before he was caught and bowled by the much smitten off breaks of Richie Lawrence with the score on 130.

What really got Phoenix back in contention was the 53-run partnership between former CYM men Conor Kelly (30) and Nat King Cole (28), ably assisted by Conor Armstrong's increasing inability to propel the ball anywhere near the cut strip. The 'doctor's' fourth over cost 15: a boundardy 4, a leg bye, and ten wides.

As the drizzle closed in, Phoenix caught up with the hyphen of Duckworth/Lewis, but fell behind again each time they lost a wicket, Oliver Plunkett caught and bowled by Lawrence , Polly Kelly a victim of the brothers Richardson. Steven Neill and Sean Green kept them in the hunt, but Neill was caught by Terry Richardson off Shiel still twenty-two runs short, and Wardell kept his wicket as the deficit was more than halved.

But Jonty was unable to keep Shiel out, and Phoenix were all out for 222, including 47 extras (31 wides). The Richardsons bowled their nine overs for 1/28 and 1/29, Shiel took 4/40 off 8.2 overs, Lawrence 2/52 off his 9, and Armstrong 2/58 off 8, including 17 wides. Jonty was out on the second ball of the 44th over, and I don't think there would have been time for a 45th, so Phoenix would probably have won on the countback. Very nearly a very interesting end to a very interesting game!

'Sorry dear, ten minutes early after I got past Lanky's milk float on the M1/M50 interchange.'