Some scrambling by stalwarts such as Michael MacKenzie has helped Taieri avoid the unthinkable and it will field a senior team this summer, after all. But the situation is still fairly tenuous. There are just 15 players confirmed.
It is a painfully thin squad, which presents all the obvious problems and some more subtle ones for MacKenzie, who was been called in ''to help get the team out on the park''.
He has taken on the role of manager-cum-coach and is running the team training sessions at Brooklands Park twice a week.
''We've put together a squad of about 15 players,'' MacKenzie said.
''But with no second grade team, if I have to drop a few players down, where do I drop them to? So that is going to be a challenge for us, going forward this year.
''If we do have everybody available, how am I going to manage that situation?
''The opposite is also true, of course. There is no second grade team to pluck players from if there is a bad run of injuries or a significant number of players unavailable.
"We've increased our numbers every week for the last couple of weeks, so there are always a couple of people who just rock up you didn't know were coming.''
MacKenzie made his senior debut for the club in 1990 and also made two first-class appearances for Otago in 1992-93. He is a life member, a committee member and passionate about the Taieri Cricket Club.
''I'm hoping for a mid-table finish. Anything in the mid-table would be a good effort for us. I just want to get us off the bottom. That's the key.
''We'll have a very good bowling attack but it will be just about getting the runs on the board. We'll probably be looking at picking a lot of all-rounders, because we don't have a lot of out and out specialist batsmen.'
