Depleted Richmond Wins Softball

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32117, 13 October 1969, Page 8

Depleted Richmond Wins Softball

In a game surprisingly free of errors for the opening round of the men’s senior softball season on Saturday Richmond beat Western Suburbs, 2-0, and showed that in spite of the loss of several players from last year’s team it should still provide one of the strongest challenges for championship honours.

The pitching duel between K. Smith (Richmond) and J. A. Baliantyne (Western Suburbs) was closely fought, with Smith having a slight superiority at the final analysis.

Smith’s clever variation never allowed the battery of R. Hall, R. Mullally and K. Palermo to settle down and Western Suburbs were restricted to very few safe hits. In another close game, Papanui B was able to hold on to an early lead to beat Deep Freeze 64, in spite of a

great rally by the latter team in the sixth innings. The other two games of the competition were not of a similar quality, however, and both United and Papanui A were able to coast to comfortable wins. RichmonS Z, Wastarn Suburbs t With both teams keeping their fielding errors to a minimum In the early innings of the game, there were no runs registered, although Richmond's T. Smith reached third base in the second Innings. It was K. Smith, who played an excellent all-round game who brought Richmond its first run at the bottom of the fourth Innings after M. Rewal bad got a hit past R. Hall at second base.

in the sixth innings, scoring R-icnmond’s second run after some determined teamwork. Smith hit a lusty pinch hit inaldo first base. Ho was advanced to second with a sacrifice bunt by Rowai. T. Smith then placed a hit In front of the centre fielder to bring K. Smith home. For Richmond, K. Smith pitched five strike-outs and one walk and gave away four hits, while Western Suburbs* Ballantyne pitched three strike*outs and a walk, and allowed eight safe hits.

Papanui B i, Deep Freeze < It was not until the top of the fourth innings that Papanui’s K. Easton was able to ■core his team’s first run, after W. Tait hit a two-base drive. T, Prescott scored in the fifth after J. Gurrero had walked B. McGregor with the base loaded. A. Easter brook brought R. Newson, Easton and McGregor home with a long hit over centre field to give Ms teem a 5-0 lead.

Deep Freeze staged a spirited rally in the fifth and sixth innings to score four runs. The left-handed B. Mansfield, hit a long home run past left field in the fifth, and J. Boyd, R. Foster and F. Weges scored in the next innings. For Papanui T. Prescott had an impressive game. He pitched throughout and was a capable bottom-order batter. Deep Freeze used Gurrero and J. Dunn as pitchers and both proved difficult to get away. Papanui A 11, Kaiapol 2 Faced by some indifferent pitching and fielding by the opposition, Papanui, the champion side, had little trouble in scoring at a steady rate. Home runs were hit by A. Scherp and D. Patterson, but all the Papanui players batted consistently. M. Reid managed to hit safely on two occasions. R. Johnston and J. Shepherd both batted well for KaUpoi, but the team made too many errors (eight to Papanui’* two) for it to have much chance of holding the opposition. M. Reid pitched consistently for Papanui, but was slower than last season. He struck out six Kaiapol batters and gave away four hits but no walks. B. Grimes (Kaiapol) pitched three strike outs but gave away two walks and nine aafe hits. United tg Combined Services 1 After a promising beginning, the Combined Services team wilted under the pressure of United's pitcher, D. Bradbury, and some determined batting by K. Thorne, D. Lanlni, and M. Nelepa. United’s sixth innings, its be-st, brought in a bounty of four runs. Thorne hit a home run, and then B. Mountford. J. Peterson and Bradbury registered runs.

K. Smith w»» successful again