Sideline Sid Sports correspondent & historian www.sunlive.co.nz

There is no bigger prize in Bay of Plenty Baywide Cricket than the time-honoured Williams Cup, where history and ambition combine, to produce explosive cricket action.

Presented to the Rotorua Cricket Association by Mr and Mrs Godfrey Williams in 1932, the Williams Cup is the big prize of Baywide premier cricket and is usually contested in the second half of the season.

Starting life as a Rotorua Cricket Association prize, the trophy commonly referred to by today's players as the "Old Bill", was expanded into a Baywide trophy when the Albion Cricket Club from Tauranga annexed the trophy in 1936.

The symbol of Baywide Cricket superiority became a journey that traversed the Eastern Bay of Plenty, Te Puke and Rotorua regions, before the Western Bay of Plenty took a stranglehold on the big prize in the 1980's.

The Williams Cup is seen by many young players as a pathway to provincial representation and professional cricket.

Tauranga Boys' College has become a BOPCA representative production line, with many of the Bay of Plenty players in recent seasons having been TBC graduates.

The second half of the season provides the opportunity to shine for a number of TBC First XI new selections, who replace the school leavers.

A quick look at the Williams Cup history, since the advent of the new millennium, indicates that Otumoetai Cadets and Mount Maunganui are entitled to enjoy favoritism to win this year's title race.

Defending Williams Cup champions, Cadets, have won the Williams Cup seven times since 2003, with the Mount lurking close behind with five victories from 2008.

Predictions of this season winner, sees a visit to the first-half of the season - the Bay of Plenty Cup premier results.

Mount Maunganui lead the current standings with Rotorua's Central Indians and Tauranga Boys' College in close attendance.

Key Baywide Cup results include Central Indians chasing down Cadets big target of 290 in round one.

Tauranga Boys' College lowered the boom on the Rotorua combined team in the second stanza, with Tauranga Boys' rolling Cadets for 110 in round three.

Mount Maunganui flexed their muscles last weekend, when Greerton paid a visit to Mount headquarters at Blake Park.

The hosts posted 262 for the loss of nine wickets, and then proceeded to bowl the visitors out for 140 to claim a 122 run victory.

Gazing into the crystal ball of the future, this writer sees Mount Maunganui and last year's runner-up Central Indians, in the frame for the four-team playoffs.

Tauranga Boys' College young men will relish the challenge with school pride and individual ambitions big motivating factors in chasing the big prize.

While Cadets lurk in sixth place in the Bay of Plenty Cup standings, they only have to look back to last season, where they shook off mediocre first half of the season form to emerge triumphant at season end.

Te Puke and Greerton have some chance of making the regular season top four, while Papamoa, Taupo and Geyser City look destined to make up the numbers.