Softball squad named

Press, 16 September 1976, Page 36

Softball squad named

TIM DUNBAR

By

The first action of the new Canterbury softbail selectors, Messrs B. Mountford and A. Hall, is likely to be a controversial one in some circles.

They named yesterday an initial squad of 10 to contest the Rothmans national tournament at Wellington over the Christmas-New Year holidays, even though the club season is still 16 days away. The full squad is: Bryan Mountford, Paul McFarlane, Honey, Fife (United Ascot); Tony Mountford, Francis (“Tiny”) Lawrence, Hall (United-City); Gordon Phillips, Dale Eagar (Papanui); Greg Panagiotidis (Richmond). The representative team will have no major assignment until the South Island Jeffries Cup tournament at Timaru on December 4 and 5.

The selectors expect criticismon the grounds that the

team has been picked too early and purely on last season’s form. They also anticipate cries of chib bias, as seven of the 10 named are from their own club, United. But Mountford, who broke new ground with his appointment as player-coach, emphasises that the squad had to be picked now becaues of an immediate need to raise the $2OOO required to send the team away. “In previous years, the coach, lan Pollock, raised all the money himself. All we had to do was play softball. But now it is up to us to get the money together,” Mountford said. Mr Hall, at a team meeting on Tuesday evening, told the members that they would "swim across the strait” on Boxing Day unless they concentrated on raising the money over the next few weeks.

Major surprises in the squad are the absence of the former New Zealand representatives, Colin Chee and

Chris McDonald (both' Papanui), and the inclusion of two teen-age players, Alan Hall, aged 17, and Douglas Honey, aged 19. McDonald, who is without peer as an outfielder in Canterbury, had a dismal national tournament as a batter last season, but found fine form later. Chee’s superb base-running and sharp infielding may be missed.

Three players — Dennis Rea, Murray Reid, and Geoff Roberts — are unavailable at this stage and the New Zealand trialist pitcher, Dave Bradbury, is undecided.

Mountford said that he wanted to take only about 12 players to Wellington but four or five players would be added to the squad at the end of October before the final pruning was done. Although there was a predominance of United players in the squad, he expected that the final top nine, provided one or two other leading players became available, might include only two or three United players. “Don't conclude that the selection of this side was a five-minute job,” he said. "It was a well-thought out team.”