WOODLANDS will have to make do without their skipper Pieter Swanepoel for two huge matches this weekend.

The JCT600 Bradford League heavyweights face First Division title rivals Cleckheaton today at Albert Terrace and meet Drakes Huddersfield League side Hoylandswaine tomorrow in the Solly Sports Heavy Woollen Cup final at Ossett (noon).

"Pieter has gone to a 20-year school reunion in South Africa," explained Woodlands' cricket secretary Brian Pearson.

"This has been arranged for a long time and, of course, we didn't know how the fixtures would fall.

"Both of them are massive games, and we take the Heavy Woollen Cup as seriously as we do anything. It is a prestigious competition."

However, the absence of Swanepoel is not their only worry as all-rounder Chris Brice is battling against a knee injury.

Pearson explained: "Initially we thought it was ligament trouble but now we think it is a dislocated kneecap.

"Chris, who became a new father for the first time last Sunday (he has a son, Marcus Timothy) will have a net and a fitness test running in straight lines, and if he passes that we will see how he goes against Cleckheaton.

"But Cieran Garner, an experienced second-teamer, will come in for Pieter."

Pearson admits that he doesn't know a great deal about Hoylandswaine, who are second in their Premier Division.

He added: "The only two players that we know anything about are Gharib Razak, who used to play for Baildon, and Alex Morris, who used to play at Hanging Heaton.

"But it is very much an 'even-steven' final. We like Ossett as a final venue and expect the wicket to be fast."

It is Hoylandswaine's first appearance in the final but Woodlands' third.

They won it in 2004, defeating Spen Victoria by 36 runs at Liversedge, where they lost the 2005 decider to Barnsley by 18 runs, while the Oakenshaw club's defeat in the 1999 final, by seven wickets to Baildon, was at Ossett.