College Sport: Avondale cricket star scoops awards pair

Wanganui Intermediate's Jak Foster gets some practice in for the North Island Junior Softball Tournament held this week. Photo / APN

Avondale's Sachin Variath upstaged more highly-rated rivals in claiming batsman of the year honours.

He also collected the special award for the most outstanding performance of the year for his unbeaten 261 against Macleans College in March.

The other categories were dominated by King's who shared two-day championship honours with AGS. The two powerhouses of Auckland schools cricket also shared the School Championship Shield, a new award to recognise the best performed school across all grades in a season.

Mark Chapman of King's took bowlers of the year honours and was also voted the player's player of the year while wicketkeeper Will McKay collected that award. Schoolmate Simon Hickey was named player of the year.

To complete their list of accolades, Roy Goodyear was honoured as coach of the year.

While he obviously had a very talented group of players to work with, Goodyear's ability to mould them and create a culture aimed at getting the best from his charges was duly recognised.

King's won the Auckland Gillette Cup, RH Marryatt Cup and a share of the two-day championship. They will represent the north in next week's Gillette Cup finals in Palmerston North.

Rangitoto College won the inaugural Spirit of Cricket award - decided by rankings out of 10 given to each premier A team by their opposition and the official umpires in each game.

Rangitoto were well led by captain Travis Brown and coach Nick White in setting a good example on and off the field.

Honours were shared in the premier B awards. Although the King's 2nd XI won the two-day title, the individual awards went elsewhere with Lewis Goodwin (TGS) taking the batting honours and Jacob Riley (AGS 2nd XI) the top bowler trophy. Sheldon Scott (Kristin) was named best wicketkeeper.

Sancta Maria, winners of the premier C grade, also had the best batsman and wicketkeeper.

Avondale College were overshadowed by EGGS in the premier girls - both teams will contest the NZCT Cup in Taupo next week - but Avondale produced the top bowler and top wicketkeeper while Maddie Green (EGGS) won the batting award.

Warwick Gibbs (MAGS) was acknowledged for his untiring efforts in being named as the first recipient of the Service to Cricket Award.

In presenting the award it was noted that Gibbs has given so much to the sport at school level for 37 years from coach to manager, scorer to taxi driver, mentor to administrator.

He began at what he modestly described as the bottom of the pecking order taking his school's 6B1 cricket team in 1972. From 1977-1999 he coached the MAGS 2nd XI and also took the 1st XI for three years from 1992-1995.

From 2000 he has been involved with the 1st XI every Saturday as manager and scorer as well as the countless hours spent at meetings and midweek practices. He also managed to fit in the load required from a fulltime teacher.

ADVENTURE RACING

Many might consider the holidays are coming early for as number of Year 9 and 10 pupils from around New Zealand but there is no suggestion that the 96 teenagers about to embark on the Youthtown Get2Go Challenge on Great Barrier Island next week will be able to relax.

Described by organisers, the Sir Edmund Hillary Outdoor Pursuits Centre, as a combination of the Amazing Race, Treasure Island and Survivor rolled into one, the five-day event is seen as the ultimate test.

Contested by teams of eight - four boys and four girls - the challenge brings together the 12 winners of regional competitions staged during the second and third terms.

The combined team from Whangarei BHS and Whangarei GHS will defend their title. Their toughest challenge is expected to come from the New Plymouth BHS/GHS team who won two years ago and the always-strong Thames High combination.

Auckland schools will be represented by Takapuna Grammar who won the Waitakere/North Harbour region and the Auckland Grammar/St Cuthbert's team who won the Auckland/Counties Manukau final. The southernmost team is Fiordland College representing Southland.

Team members, aged 13 and 14 years, will face a series of challenges over the first two days including tests in rock climbing, orienteering, kayaking and mountainbiking.

The remaining three days will present a number of tasks including raft building and camping skills.

CRICKET

WAIKATO

The curtain came down on another competitive season with the finals of the 1A and 1B term four competitions producing an interesting result.

All three matches in the 1A championship were won by the team batting second while the 1B matches were all won by the team batting first.

The 1A final was a high-scoring affair in which visiting St John's College elected to bat first and made a steady start with Brett Kennedy, despite having to use a runner, scoring a useful 23. There was early success for St Peter's however, as in-form Sam Cooper fell for 11 to a superb one-handed Ben Schilt catch.

It was left to Jude Cooper to hold the innings together. He compiled a patient 67 but lacked the support he needed to help his team to a really big score in the end reaching 199/9 from their 50 overs. Jonathan Whitley (3-33) was the pick of the St Peter's bowlers.

St Peter's were made to work for it in reply eventually getting home by two wickets in reaching 203/8 in the 46th over.

Faced with Sam Pritchard 's accurate bowling - he finished with 4-36 - the St Peters batsmen struggled to ever take command eventually getting home on the back of some tidy efforts but without one solid match-winning knock.

In his final home game, captain Jarrod Mongston top-scored with a fine 47 with Schilt, in the middle order, contributing a hard-hit 45. Alex Lunn hit the winning four to get St Peter's home and allow them to retain the Dave Hoskin Cup.

St Paul's Collegiate kept their best for last to beat Matamata College by eight wickets in the 3rd/4th play-off.

Matamata won the toss and elected to bat but struggled throughout their innings in the face of accurate bowling and fielding by St Paul's.

Only three batsmen managed double figures as they were bowled out for 86 in the 40th over.

St Paul's chased the total from the first ball of their innings with Josh Fawcett's unbeaten 33 steering them to victory by eight wickets in the 17th over.

Following the trend of batting first after winning the toss, the HBHS Development XI were soon in trouble against Cambridge HS as their opening partnership ended after just 13 minutes.

Luckily for them, Adam Buist was quickly into stride hitting several boundaries and eventually reaching a well-deserved half century and going on to 74 before being trapped leg before by Shaun Wilkie after his 2 -hour stay.

The innings eventually ended at a reasonable 193.

Cambridge began cautiously and lost their first wicket at 13. Hugo Bothma joined Caleb Webb and they added 77 runs for the second wicket. Bothma played some superb shots and reached his 50 in just under an hour.

Webb worked hard in the support role, constantly looking for singles and rotating the strike for Bothma. Elliot Santner struck in the 21st over to remove Bothma, inducing him to try and cut, Bothma edged the ball to wicketkeeper Robert Kaihe.

Webb continued to work hard in what had become rather warm conditions. Nik Boyle blazed away in typical fashion and the pair added 50 before Webb was bowled for 29.

Jono Feast and Mitch Kirkbride eventually guided Cambridge home scoring the last 45 runs in seven overs for a six-wicket win.

Morrinsville managed an only modest 120 after being sent in by Hamilton BHS Emerging XI in the 1B final but in the end that proved to be enough.

They should have scored a lot more after racing to 50 from the opening five overs. The innings quickly fell apart as Josh Maree bagged an impressive 3-11 and Joe Tourelle 3-49.

Defending such a small total, it was left to the Morrinsville bowlers to step up. With seven wickets between them, Michael Wratt and Tom Arnold did the damage as they skittled HBHS for just 105.

Batting first after winning the toss in the 3rd/4th play-off, Hillcrest High, spearheaded by 82 from Nigel Lim who faced only 59 deliveries, reached an imposing 213 after being 103/6 at one stage. They maintained an impressive run rate of almost six runs-an-over throughout their 38 overs.

In reply, Chad Salvatierra (56) got Melville off to a flyer dispatching his first ball for six as the score raced to 21/0 after 2 overs.

Two vital wickets taken by Seb Curry kept Hillcrest in the game as Salvatierra continued to dispatch anything short and making the most of two dropped chances to reach his 50 from 40 deliveries.

He departed at 86/4 in the 13th over allowing the Hillcrest bowlers to seize the initiative with wickets falling at regular intervals as Sean Rudman (3-10) cleaned up the tail and the innings ended as five batsmen failed to score in the 26th over.

In the 5th/6th play-off, Te Awamutu won the toss elected to bowl first against the St Peter's 2nd XI.

After a steady, but hardly threatening, run-rate of around three and an over and a steady loss of wickets until Jonny Schroder came to bat. He scored a quick 46 and put on a 61-run partnership with Matt Joubert. Once Schroder was dismissed, the innings quickly ended at 193.

Te Awamutu got away to a flying start and scoring a steady rate of six an over but unfortunately also lost quick wickets. Jordan Belton took an impressive four wickets but as with Te Awamutu, the extras contributed significantly.

After many chances went begging, Matt Joubert took two wickets with successive balls and the innings ended quickly with St Peter's winning by 66 runs.

WATER POLO

WBHS retained their North Island junior title and claimed their fifth victory in 10 years with a 10-6 win over perennial rivals Rangitoto who were chasing their first championship success since 2006.

Ahead 4-0 after the first quarter, Westlake were always in control with Michael Goff awarded the player of the tournament award for the second successive year.

Tauranga BC dominated the bronze match beating Sacred Heart, who finished third last year, 8-3. AGS, runners-up in 2009, beat Hamilton BHS for fifth.

WBHS and Rangitoto will be back at it again on Sunday night when they clash in the Auckland SS A grade final at the Millennium pool.

Kahn Andersong and Matt Taylor (Rangitoto), Cameron Hayes (Tauranga BC) and Denziel Nuielua (Sacred Heart) were named the most outstanding players. Anton Sunde (Kristin) took that award in division two.

Thirty-nine teams took part in the championships which were played in four pool across the Auckland region. The North Island championships have been played annually since 1989.

Rangitoto College dominated the girl's championship over the four days and ran out comfortable 13-6 winners over Diocesan in the final.

It was a second successive silver for Diocesan who lost last year's final to St Cuthbert's,

The bronze match was the closest of the medal play-offs with Baradene beating defending champions St Cuthbert's 6-5 to claim their first top three finish.

Rangitoto's Ema Carevic was named player of the tournament with Rebecca Dreardon (Baradene), Ricci Fergio (Diocesan), Jordyn Knights (Rangitoto) and Zephyer Herriott (Wellington East GC) named as the most outstanding.

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