Pair nominated to take over softball coaching

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32542, 27 February 1971, Page 20

Pair nominated to take over softball coaching

The future of Canterbury senior men’s representative softball is expected to continue in experienced hands after the provincial executive meets on Monday evening to replace Mr H. L. Gable as coach.

Mr Gable will move to one of the strongholds of American softball Jacksonville, Florida—at the end of this season, after successfully raising the standard of Canterbury inter-club and representative play in the last two years. Two men with long experience in the game have been nominated by clubs to fill the vacant position, and ' there is a possibility that more nominations will have been received, together with those for the positions of selectors and manager by the time of the meeting. The coaching nominees are Messrs K. H. Bingley and I. R. Pollock.

Bingley, who is aged 38, moved to Christchurch four years ago, and has been playing for Western Suburbs. He was in the Canterbury team which toured the North Island earlier this season after an absence of 10 years from serious competitive play. He played for New Zealand three times and The ‘Rest twice during a 10-year (representative career for (Auckland, which began in

1951 and included participation in eight national Beatty Cup championships. He was the Canterbury coach in the 1968-69 season, and was a selector last season. Pollock, aged 34, the captain and vice-captain of the Papanui A and Canterbury teams, respectively, this season, intends to retire at the end of the season after an outstanding career. He was a New Zealand triallist in 1966 and 1969 and a member of the South Island teams of 1962 and 1963. He has represented South Canterbury, Otago, and Canterbury since beginning his career in Timaru as a 16-year-old pitcher in 1953. SQUAD PLAN It was Bingley and Gable (who was the manager) who initiated the Canterbury early-season-squad plan after the province’s rather dismal showing at the 1968-69 Beatty Cup tournament in the Hutt Valley. They suggested a winter squad of 22 be announced at the end of each season, and that the Beatty Cup team be increased to 15, including three pitchers, as a safeguard against injury. That this scheme has paid handsome dividends is evident by the great improvement in Canterbury’s Beatty

Cup results in the last three seasons. In the 1968-69 season an injury-plagued team was beaten by 10 runs in five innings by both Wellington and Hutt Valley—the first and second-ranked teams nationally for many years. Canterbury did not play in the top section of the 1969-70 tournament in Invercarill, but at Wellington this season the team played 13 close games, and was, with Wellington and Hutt Valley, one of only three teams wfiich did not lose by 10 runs or more at any stage. CHALLENGING TASK Pollock was quoted earlier in the season as saying that Mr Gable would probably not see the full fruits of his labours before he returned to the United States, and the failure by Canterbury to burst into the very top strata of New Zealand softball this season has seen these words borne out. To Messrs Bingley or Pollock—or to whoever else may be elected on Monday evening—will fall the challenging task of breaking the barrier within the next few seasons. Nominations for the positions of selectors—besides Messrs Bingley and Pollock—include Messrs R- Hall (a present selector), A. Hall, G. Hilder and K. Cooper.