GREAT Harwood's Paul Houldsworth is finding his first year as skipper at the Jennings Ribblesdale League title contenders tough going.

Especially when everyone keeps reminding him that the last time they won the league was in 1900.....

Everybody talks about that.

I've been here 22 years -- since I was nine -- and at the start of every season we say "This will be our year" and so far it hasn't happened.

We desperately want to win the league and even though we are through to the last four of the Ramsbottom Cup, I would take a stuffing if it meant we won the league title.

That means more.

There are four or five teams up there who could win it this season.

The current league leaders Earby have a good pro. We lost to them on Saturday but I didn't see that much difference between the sides.

We dropped five catches before we got their opener out -- but I couldn't say a lot as I dropped one! In fact, I've not been too hot on the catches this season -- I've had just two and dropped them both!

Then there's Cherry Tree and Blackburn Northern and we're fourth. There are seven points in it and we will be exactly half-way through the season this weekend so there's still a long way to go.

But we don't want to finish any less than first.

There's no point competing if you don't want to try and be the best.

And if we do get it, there will be a huge party at Great Harwood -- it will be massive!

But while the league is the priority, the Cup is a huge occasion. We've won it twice since I have been here.

We do usually get through to the semi-finals though and I think we can beat Ribblesdale Wanderers in the last four. They have started to come good again -- their pro Shahid Nawaz is class and got a century last week against Whalley but we think we can beat them on the day.

Our pro Farhan Adil has started to come good as well. He is quite a quiet lad but has started finding his feet.

There was a couple of poor innings for him early on in the season but he has played well in the last couple of games.

He was promoted to opener on Sunday for the cup game and made an unbeaten 72 against Clitheroe. I think he will go on to get over 1,000 runs this season which we will be more than happy with.

But I must admit I'm not enjoying the experience of being the captain too much -- I think I might only have one season at it.

I liked the days when I could turn up at 1.55pm, get changed, bowl and bat and not think too much.

Now I have to think throughout the entire game -- who should bowl next, where the fielders should be, how are we going to get him out?

It's too much -- I never realised how hard it would be and I have the utmost respect for all those captains that I have played with now!

I think I am too laid back and too soft.

People say I should bat higher up the order and bowl more but I like to give others a chance.

This is especially as we have a young side -- I'm 31 and there is only the wicketkeeper that is older.

Ten years together and this side should be very strong -- although it would be great if we didn't have to wait any longer and we could finally win the league title this season!