North Albury will start a firm favourite to defend its Albury and District Bowling Association grade three pennant title this season.
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Last season it won the district pennant by defeating Henty in the final and advanced to the Zone 8 (Riverina) play-offs at Tumut.
Victory against Wagga RSL enabled North Albury to participate in the state play-offs at Yamba.
It produced a creditable performance with a win, draw and loss, but failed to advance to the semi-final play-offs.
The Hoppers have made changes to last season's winning team with Dave Brown coming into the team as a second after skipping in grade four last year.
Duncan Balloch skipped one of the rinks in grade three last season, but moved to third for highly-performed skip Stephen Broad.
Balloch swaps position with Allen "Salty" Ross, who has taken over skipping a rink, while stalwart Norm Honey skips the remaining combination.
Peter Fitzgerald played as a lead in grade three last season, but is not playing, and Darren Renner is skipping in grade four.
Gerald O'Brien is playing third for Ross and Bob Gough moves to second.
There appears plenty of depth in the North Albury rinks.
They are notoriously slow starters to the season, but are usually in contention come finals time.
Henty likewise has abundant depth and is expected to finish near the top of the ladder.
Howlong could improve significantly with the inclusion of former Wodonga A1 skip John Dawson.
Dawson has previously played at the club and his wealth of experience will be telling.
He has been skipping a Wodonga rink in recent years, playing in many premierships.
But last season Wodonga was narrowly beaten by Benalla in the final at Corowa Civic.
Howlong plays at home to North Albury, which should give an insight into the prospects for the season.
Henty plays at home against Lavington Panthers and Culcairn is hosting the Commercial Club.
The district's pennant season runs for 10 weeks before semi-finals and finals are contested on the one weekend.
North Albury will also field teams in grades four, five and six.
The grade four side is away to Walla Walla, while grade five and six will host the Commercial Club and Howlong, respectively.
