Todd expects to play in Champions League

Former Wairarapa all-rounder Greg Todd expects to be part of the Otago Volts team which will play in the inaugural multi-million dollar Champions League Twenty20 competition in India between October 8 and 23.
Todd has been contracted to the Volts over the past five seasons and has played regularly for their State championship and Twenty20 sides over that period.
The Volts side for the Champions League is still in the process of being selected but Todd said from Christchurch yesterday he had spoken to officials of the Otago association and he was "pretty confident" of making the touring party.
Winning New Zealand's Twenty20 title last season was always expected to qualify the Volts for the Indian tourney which boasts a prize fund of $A9.85m, but Todd admitted that because of the lengthy delay between that victory and notification of their Champions League entry players were beginning to think it wasn't going to happen.
"We are all pretty excited now, it's a huge opportunity to play in such a major event," Todd said. "They are talking about crowds of 50,000 plus, that will be massive for us."
Todd who has been one of the batting stars for the Volts since moving south with an average of over 40 last season to and 50 the two seasons before, concedes his batting style is probably better suited to the longer versions of the game, where he bats at first drop, but he also enjoys Twenty20.
"They tend to use me there when the spinners are on so I'm never too sure where I'll be in the order," he said.
"But then again it's a game where you have to be adaptable, things can change dramatically from ball to ball."
Two other former Wairarapa players in Ross Taylor and Jesse Ryder could also be involved in the Champions League.
Their IPL side, the Bangalore Royal Challengers, who were runners-up in that competition, are one of the other 11 teams confirmed for the tourney.
Meanwhile two athletes with strong Wairarapa connections have been included in the New Zealand team to contest the world mountain running championships in Campodoilcino, Italy in September.
Sarah Biss, now of Rotorua, was a member of Athletics Masterton in the mid-1980's when she was one of the top secondary schools cross-country runners in the country while Dougal Thorburn was a regular competitor on the roads here just two or three years ago while working as a doctor at Masterton Hospital. He is now living in Dunedin.
There are Wairarapa connections too in the Chiefs Super 14 rugby team to take on the Bulls in the grand final in Pretoria on Sunday morning.
Lock Craig Clarke was born in Masterton and played for Wairarapa-Bush at junior and secondary school level while assistant coach Craig Stevenson, who played at prop, was a member of the Rathkeale College first XV and also repped for the Wairarapa-Bush secondary schools side.