BASEBALL - A major push to get kids side competitive

World domination is the target for Whangarei's young baseballers as they were put through their paces at a two-day camp last week in an attempt to select the area's first ever team to attend the nationals.
The search for the Northland Majors - an under-12 team, has been going for eight weeks. The original squad of more than 20 players has to be whittled down to 15 for the national competition in Auckland on February 19-22.
The squad was put through its paces by its coaching staff assisted by the sport's Oceania Development officer Ray Brown and New Zealand Development Officer CJ Jayasekera.
"They've been helping us identify the best players and making sure we select a team with all the skills they need to be a championship team," the Majors' manager Ed Irving said.
Irving, like the other coaches of the team, all come from a softball background and have all appreciated the help from the professional coaches.
"It's only the third year that the sport has been here in Whangarei and it's been a steep learning curve for all of us but the kids are soaking it up," he said.
The plan is to keep the majority of this squad together over the next couple of years and give them a chance to develop into a team that can win the national championships.
The founder of baseball here, Miguel Abascal, wanted to get an under-12 team together that could win the national competition within five years or so and would then go on to represent New Zealand at the World Championships in Taiwan, Irving said.
While the sport is new here, it is well organised worldwide and two of the Whangarei lads trying out for the team, Manaaki Tawhiwhirangi and Shae Currie, have already scored free trips overseas to Japan and Australia respectively.
"We're out to let people know that baseball is the new softball but there's actually a lot more opportunities with baseball, you can have a professional career in the sport, there's travel opportunities and the sport is an Olympic one," Irving said.
"Obviously the goal is to increase the number of sides we can enter in national competition because there is so much raw talent up here," Irving said.
He said there are also plans to introduce a senior competition to Whangarei. "If adults play then the kids will want to play as well and we can further strengthen the sport," he said.