Lae softball unveil plans for 2009-10

THE Lae Softball Association (LSA) have laid out their plans for the 2009-2010 season, starting with the association’s annual general meeting (AGM) set for next Tuesday.
Association president Isaac Minicus is confident of a good turnout by club delegates at the AGM where the business of the preceding year would be dealt with and properly closed to enable the new season’s business to proceed.
Minicus said in a statement yesterday that it was expected all clubs, who participated in the 2008-2009 season, would field teams again this season for both men’s and women’s divisions.
Minicus has also laid out some very interesting and ambitious plans, which are expected to take softball back to its high of the mid 1980s.
It would involve plans to grow the talent base of the sport in the province as well as seriously examine softball’s existing infrastructure.
This would include the development of a home for the sport in Lae.
“Softball in Lae is short-served and is going nowhere as a first choice sport, needing a very big injection of human and financial capital to see its growth,” he said.
“This would be in terms of new people both mature and young adults and children actively playing the sport.”
In the New Year, LSA have set themselves a mandate to bring the sport to the districts like Wau-Bulolo, Ramu, Markham-Kaiapit, Finschhafen and the Morobe patrol post coastal areas.
In association with the provincial sports office and various public and private bodies, LSA plans to conduct awareness, coaching, umpiring and scoring clinics for the young and old in the districts.
There are also plans to employ a full-time softball development officer and an administration officer to conduct these training camps and have a properly resourced office.
Next September, the association have set their radar on staging a Morobe province grassroots tournament in the city.
The event would bring together new softball recruits to participate and display their talents.
It would also provide an opportunity for the management to asses the success or otherwise of its clinical and development programmes for improvement or refining their strategies.
The goal of these programmes would be to position softball in Lae to win national games and press for spots in the national side playing internationally.
He  said there was also an ambitious plan to build a softball stadium as the home of the game in Lae and the Momase region.