Thursday, March 22, 2012

Hawker, Canberra — The visiting New Zealand Junior Black Sox beat the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) boys U15 team 10-1 and 12-5 in two games last night played at the Hawker International Softball Centre.

The match was part of a training camp in advance of a tournament. New Zealand dominated the game. Auckland’s Marshall Layt-Maynarf pitched for New Zealand in the second game.

New Zealand has long been a power in men’s softball. When the New Zealand’s junior players were asked how they won so easily when Australia has been so dominant in the past few years, they replied Australia’s open men’s team has been able to win based on the strength of one pitcher. When a representative of Softball ACT was asked about this, they confirmed this but said Australia dominated because of not one pitcher, but two. One of those pitchers, Adam Folkard, has the best pitching speed in the world in the men’s game and plays for the ACT.

After their games wound up, the New Zealand players watched the second match of the Australia versus New Zealand test series. They socialized with the Australian locals but most left before the second match concluded at 22:45 AEST (11:45 UTC).

New Zealand will go to Sydney to compete in junior international challenge in Sydney this Saturday.