Ramsey host Douglas South at Mooragh Park this Saturday in the Manx Trophy and have an opportunity to hit the top of the table with early leaders Douglas North having a free week.

It will be tricky for the northerners though, as they lost to Douglas Celts last season in the Manx Cup and, if anything, this Douglas South side is likely to be a little stronger.

In the other game this week, Southern Nomads travel to Vagabonds to see if they can pick up their first points of the campaign.

Ramsey have undoubtedly improved on where they were last season. The addition of Danny Howard, Tom Moffatt and Peter Frankwick has helped and the close result against Vagabonds last Saturday bears this out.

It was nonetheless a defeat and Ramsey won’t find life any easier against Douglas South. They ran their clubmates to within five points last week and that was a side which beat Vagas by 24 points on the opening weekend.

Home advantage may count for something here, but Douglas must surely start as favourites.

At Ballafletcher, Vagabonds take on Southern Nomads. The southerners have finally got their wish for regular competition against league standard opposition, but defeat against Ramsey in week one must have them wondering. They’d taken Ramsey last season in the cup but had struggled against Vagabonds and Douglas Celts. Their earlier meeting with Ramsey this season saw a four-try to two defeat at their own Field of Dreams.

The coaching staff will be working hard this week for the trip to Vagas where they can expect Mark Oldfield to be a total menace with or without the ball and former Nomad Ross McCulloch looking very impressive with the ball in hand. I suspect a Vagabonds’ win here.

The Manx Bowl looks to be a two-horse race after two rounds, with Emerging Nomads and Vagabonds Hornets leading the way. These two avoid each other on the field until November 6 when they meet on a Friday night at Ballafletcher.

This week the Hornets face Ramsey B at Ballafletcher on the undercard for the Trophy game. The Hornets had an impressive side out last week with names like Birchall, Beckley, Cruywagen and McGreal all running out and supporting some of the lesser-known Vagas’ stars like Rob Martin.

They won big at QEII and, while Ramsey skipper Neil Hulme drew praise from the Nomads support last Saturday, his team will need to up the ante quite a bit for this game.

Elsewhere in the Bowl, Vagas Ladies head to the Field of Dreams to face Emerging Nomads. The tag variant of the game has seen some large score lines and this should be no different.

This will be the women’s third run at it and they will be gaining valuable experience which could yet turn over an unsuspecting men’s team.

Finally at Poulsom Park, Castletown take on Western Vikings in what could be a tight game. Kunal Patel and Jim Emmett both looked sharp last Saturday albeit in tag, while Vikings suffered a big home defeat.

Town will surely be feeling more confident and with home advantage may just have a slight edge.

Fixtures

Saturday, October 24

all ko @ 2.15pm

Manx Trophy

Ramsey v Douglas South @ Mooragh Park

Vagabonds v PDMS Southern Nomads

@ Ballafletcher

Manx Bowl

Vagabonds Hornets v Ramsey B

@ Ballafletcher

Emerging Nomads v Vagabonds Ladies

@ The Field of Dreams

Castletown v Western Vikings

@ Poulsom Park

DAVE CHRISTIAN