Giants blaze way to glory

"Unbelievable?. absolutely unbelievable."
Heartfelt words from Giants assistant coach Russell Thompson moments after his team had upset Hutt City United 2-0 in the grand final of the Hutt Valley premier division men's softball competition at Fraser Park, Taita yesterday.
With Giants never before having finished higher than fifth on the points table, in their nine seasons of premier division play, and having lost four of their earlier five clashes with HCU this season, most pundits were predicting a comfortable HCU win.
But with their large band of supporters cheering their every move, Giants turned on a magnificent all-round performance to out-gun HCU in every department.
"The pressure was unreal and in the end we handled it better than they did," Thompson said. "It was one of those games where the smallest mistake could have been decisive??..it was just so tense out there."
Adding to the tension were a number of controversial calls from the match officials, one of them coming at HCU's last turn at bat .
A brilliant piece of fielding and throw to first base by Giants short stop Ryan Shannahan, seemed to catch an HCU runner short of his ground, but to the amazement of the Giants players- and spectators, he was ruled safe.
This left HCU with runners on bases one and three with Giants still needing one out and Black Sox pitcher Jeremy Manley in the batting box
But as they had all game Giants responded positively to the challenge with special hero, pitcher Justin Karaitiana, enticing Manley to pop up a catch to catcher Curtis Ames to dash any hopes HCU had of success.
The coolness of Karaitiana on the pitching mound played a huge part in Giant's victory.
HCU had a powerful batting line-up, headed by one of the best strikers in the business in Black Sox Rhys Caseley, but they managed only two safe hits off Karaitiana over the entire game, and one of them was somewhat dubious.
Not surprisingly Thompson was fulsome in his praise of Karaitiana, describing his effort as "absolutely awesome"
"Pitching plays such a big part in games like this and Chunky (Karaitiana) was amazing," Thompson said. " They (HCU) just couldn't hit him, it was as simple as that."
HCU started with Regan Manley as pitcher, as his brother Jeremy was troubled by injury, but after four innings the latter took over the role.
Giants runs came in the fourth and fifth innings with Ames and Mark Quinn providing the hits that brought runners home. It was one of two safe hits the in-form Quinn managed during the game.
It wasn't only the control of Karaitiana as pitcher which kept HCU scoreless, but some high quality work in the field as well.
Thompson could only recall one error in the field and said that was quickly countered by a double play.
Thompson was also delighted with the support given Giants from the sidelines, saying about four in every five spectators at the match seemed to be on their side.
"There were a lot of people who travelled over the hill from the Wairarapa to get behind us and the boys were just rapt with the encouragement they got from them," he said.
Giants next assignment is the national inter-club championships which get under way at Hastings this week.