Richmond makes revival

Press, 9 March 1987, Page 26

Richmond makes revival

Three Suburbs players were given a lesson in how it feels to be a losing pitcher in the Forum Travel Premier men’s softbali competition on Saturday. The regular pitcher, Marty Grant, managed only two innings of Suburbs’ first game against Richmond. The remaining 11 innings — four against Richmond and seven against Burnside — were shared between Mark Sneddon, Mark MacFarlane and Craig Seaward, none of whom is a regular pitcher. Richmond, conscious of the threat of relegation if it finishes bottom of the table, is a fired-up team at present. Cries of delight echoed round the Burnside High School diamond as Richmond scored in every innings, except the first. In scoring 11 runs, eight Richmond batters collected 10 hits between them. The Wright brothers, Brian, Grant (2) and Marty, accounted for four of these.

Suburbs, in attempting to stem the tide of runs, used Grant, Sneddon, and MacFarlane on the mound, but the Richmond batters treated each one roughly.

Three runs came from the pitching of Grant, and four each from Sneddon and MacFarlane.

Craig Seaward was the only Suburbs batter to impress, crossing the home plate for his team’s one and only run, to make the final scoreline 11-1.

In the second match, with Craig Seaward being the fourth pitcher used, Suburbs started with a vengeance against Burnside. The lead-off batter, Brett Seaward, opened the innings with a mighty three-base hit. The next Suburbs batters rallied behind this incentive and two runs were scored.

From the second innings on, however, it was Burnside’s match, three batters, Grant Thompson, Chris Gray

and Alex Bennett collecting seven hits among them. Bennett was especially impressive with an automatic home run and a stand-up three-base hit.

Burnside, preparing for the national club' championships in Invercargill in a fortnight, would be happy with its performance in scoring eight runs and holding Suburbs to only two. Both Burnside pitchers, Roger Keith and Mitch Nelson, performed well on the mound, although the veteran, Keith, did have a shaky first innings start. The only other premier men's match was between the youthful Cardinals and Papanui. Always impressive with spirit and enthusiasm, Cardinals almost upset a complacent Papanui.

Batting first. Cardinals scored with Mike Thomas after an outfield error and a passed ball. Tony Bishop, lead-off for Papanui, scored in almost identical circum-

stances to draw level, but Cardinals then took the game by the throat, scoring once in the second and twice in the third to take a 4-1 lead.

A burly policeman, Roger Hutton, led a Papanui rally in the fourth innings with a huge automatic home run over the centre-field fence. Colin Sutherland also scored and Papanui took the lead for the first time in the fifth innings when the centre fielder, Wayne Durey, hit over the fence to score himself and Bishop. The match was forced to go to the tie-breaker eighth innings, however, after Cardinals scored the equalising run in the sixth. With first bat in the tie-breaker, Cardinals failed to score through some fine pitching by Sutherland. Papanui’s automatic runner, Brett Williams, was moved to third and then scored on an infield hit by the promising youngster, Steve Hurley, to give Papanui the match, 6-5.