Papanui softball triumph

Press, 25 February 1980, Page 3

Papanui softball triumph

At its sixth attempt Papanui has finally beaten the champion Jaks-United side in senior men’s softball match this season. It was a tremendous win by Papanui which came from behind with a ninth innings batting rally to beat United, 2-1, in the second match of its double-header at Papanui Domain yesterday.

Papanui certainly had more than its share of softball during the day. Earlier in the afternoon it had also won in extra innings, beating Jaks-United City, 2-1, in a 125 min 13-innings marathon.

The Papanui match with Jaks-United was scoreless until the top of the ninth inings when the United second baseman, Tony Mountford. came home on an infield error. At such a late stage it all looked over for Papanui, but

I the home team made a Stirling batting charge with four successive players getting safe hits off Dennis Dokis.

The single of Robert Tangaroa scored Dale Eager to tie up the scores and then the big figure of Kevin Tuuta pounded a ball to right-outfield which brought home a jubilant Tangaroa, The tall, lean Tangaroa (known as “Chub”) struck out 12 batters and gave up only five hits.

Papanui’s hits were collected by Tony Bishop, Eagar, Saunders, Tangaroa, Tuuta and Geoff Roberts. Bryan Mountford batted .500 United and Paul McFarlane, Tony Mountford and Jim McCasland all had a single one-base hit. In the early game between Papanui and City the former took a 1-0 lead when Roberts whacked a home run in the bottom of the third in-

nings and maintained it until the seventh.

It took Papanui another six innings to finish off the game. In the bottom of the thirteenth Tony Bishop raced home when Eric Tomlinson belted Anderson’s pitch through the infield.

The narrow loss to Papanui was United’s only reverse of the week-end. On Saturday, it thrashed Richmond,! 1-1, and overcame Lyttelton, 10-3. Yesterday David Bradbury shut-out Western Suburbs, 6-0, taking 14 strike-outs and giving up only three hits and a walk. He also whacked a left-field homer in the sixth innings to round off. the match nicely-

Richmond players were in rather better moods yesterday after an easy 13-1 over Albion in six innings. Home

i runs by Kevin Steel, Roy Ah iKuoi, and Neil Pasco were the highlights of Richmond’s big tally of 14 safe hits. Tony Hansen batted 1000 with four hits out of four (including a three-bagger and a two-bagger) and Laurie Laurenson (three out of four) and Paul Emms (two out of three) also had excellent games. Other matches played during the week-end resulted:— Saturday: Papanui 3, Lyttelton 2; Western Suburbs 5, Albion 0: Jaks-United City 3, Albion 0. Sunday: Lyttelton 6, Albion 2.

•A same between Albion and City scheduled for March 1 has been placed early and won by City, 7-0. " ■

POINTS TABLE Pls P W L F A Jaks-United 12 1(1 2 84 14 20. Papanui 11 9 2 48 39 18 J.aks-Citv*' 12 9 3 54 19 18 W. Subs 11 5 6 39 48 10 Lyttelton 11 4 7 29 58 8 Richmond 11 2 9 37 8(1 4 Albion* 12 1 11 19 84 2