Top softballers prosper

Press, 31 October 1986, Page 25

Top softballers prosper

Albion and Burnside will attend a big inter-club women’s softball tournament at Upper Hutt this week-end, so matches in the Dalgety Crown Travel competition were played this week.

Both sides continued on their winning way. Albion obtained revenge after its week-end encounter by beating Suburbs, 6-0, while Monowai was no match for Burnside, going down 3-14 in five innings. Compared with last Saturday’s performance, Albion used the bat effectively to pick up 11 hits. Defensively, the side looked more positive, Donna Meuli on the mound turning on a strong performance. While Suburbs did not play badly it could not get on top of Meuli’s pitching and could

only pick up three hits. Only once did the side get a runner in a scoring position. Carolyn Arthur made first on a left-field drive and was well sacrificed to second by Donna Roberts, made third on a fielder’s choice, but with two down Chris Stuart was taken at the plate, leaving Arthur stranded.

Albion’s lead-off, Trina Whittaker, began the scoring for her side at the top of the first when a left-field double by Natalie Hazelwood bought her in.

Albion’s dominance came in the third when a string of hits scored Hazelwood, Wendy Hughes, Penny Salton and Lynda O’Cain.

Hazelwood came in for her second run and final of the match in the sixth. A safe bunt had Hazelwood at first. This was followed by a good steal to second then Hughes sacrificed her to third.

Salton, who batted .750 for the game, did her job by driving to centrefield to score Hazelwood.

Burnside gave its opponent batting lessons by notching nine runs in its first turn and going through its entire order plus four. However, it blemished its

performance with some sloppy fielding, which allowed two of Monowai’s runs in.

In the bottom of the first, Jane Earnshaw and Mandy Karatau scored twice. Anita Perreau, Chris John, Raylene Forde, Katrina Dreaver and Linda Burrows scored once. Two additional runs came across the plate in the second, basically on errors, scoring John and Forde. With two down in the third, Perreau began a rally with a three-bagger and was brought in by John. Both John and Forde gained their third runs of the match. From this point the Burnside batters went off the boil.

Monowai’s Emma Richard scored in the fourth after making base on a good leftfield double. In the fifth Monowai’s Tina Wilson and Wiki Martin scored when errors occurred in Burnside’s infield, but the burst came too late. Points are:

P W L F A Pts Albion 3 3 — 21 1 6 Burnside 3 3 — 27 7 6 Pap. 1 0 1 0 10 — Subs 2 — 1 4 11 — Kereru 1 — 1 0 6 — Mono. 2 — 2 4 19 —