A North Yorkshire squash side resumes its battle for the Yorkshire Premiership title on Wednesday, January 14 (7.30pm) determined to avoid a second banana skin.

In their first match of the season against Pontefract's second stringers Harrogate Squash Club went down to a surprise 4-1 defeat. And that setback is still an irritant with team boss Paul Hornsby. But Hornsby and another key player Simon Myring will be missing for the return with Pontefract seconds on Wednesday. The pair will be on a snowboarding holiday in France, hoping the team back home will not slip up again.

Harrogate's likely line-up for the match is: Peter Barker, Adam Stevenson, Chris Gordon, Jenny Duncalf and Adam Nowakowski.

Despite their losing start to the season Harrogate are still in with great chance of taking the Premiership for the first time. For after the second team setback at Pontefract they went on to beat Pontefract first team 4-1.

Currently Pontefract firsts lead the table by nine points against Harrogate. But with 20 points at stake in each clash the title race is still wide open.

If Harrogate take the title they will be the second successive North Yorkshire side to take the trophy. The current holders are York-based Wigginton, but they are already well out of the race.

Hornsby says: "I don't think we took Pontefract second team seriously enough in that opening match. But we won't be making the same mistake this time. It was the worst possible start to the season, losing to a second team yet going on to beat their first team."

* Harrogate player Jenny Duncalf, who has made great strides in climbing the Women's World Rankings since turning professional, has dropped from 12 to 15 in the newly-published list.