Despite the club losing out on promotion to Section A of the Whitney Moore & Keller Leinster Senior League by the tantalisingly narrow margin of 15 runs, there was some cause for celebration in the Malahide pavilion on Saturday. Earlier, there had been much communication with the Park to monitor progress in the Phoenix Railway Union match, in the hope that the visitors would "tear up the form book" (as some journalists of old were wont to write) and thereby put Malahide through.

That wasn't to be; Phoenix won easily by 212 runs, while Malahide pulled off a facile 297-run victory over hapless Old Belvedere. Malahide's visiting Australian, Mike Morson, made 192, and that was the cause for the celebration, being the highest score ever by a club member.

Before leaving Australia, Morson, whose wife comes from Dunleer, looked up the Irish Cricket Union's web site to see if any cricket was played near Drogheda. The ICU's honorary secretary happens to be Malahide stalwart John Wright, so the rest, as they say, is history.

Before his near double-century, Morson had scored 661 runs, included seven fifties, for an average of 36.72. Fellow Malahide player "Max" McDonough took five wickets on Saturday, including a hat-trick, for the club's sixth XI against Balbriggan.

The Malahide women's team won the Leinster Senior League for the first time when they defeated YMCA by 87 runs. Adele Spence made 47 and skipper Catriona Beggs made 45.

Leinster, with an emphatic eight-wicket victory over Merrion, won Section A and the League title on Saturday. Clontarf, following a rumoured bout of Friday night fever, were skittled for 56 at The Nevitt by North County, for whom Joe Murphy took six for 26 including a hat-trick, but are still promoted, along with Phoenix, from Section B.

The women's 40 Overs final between Malahide and YMCA, was rained off and has been postponed to next April. No fooling.