Weekly Wrap Up – 14 October 2023

Welcome to our first weekly wrap-up for the season.

Our committee for this season is:

President : Gill Penfold
Vice President : Matt Hutchinson Secretary : Jodi Penfold
Registar : Zoe Carolan
General Committee : Tamar Hutchinson.

We have 4 teams this season:

Under 13s
Open 1
Open 2
Open 3

On behalf of our committee we welcome everyone to the 2023/24 season and hope you all have a wonderful season.

Thank you to our Umpires and Scorer for this season:

Under 13s

Week 1 - 7th October

Syndal Vs GEMSA @ Frankston 07/10/23

Welcome to all the new players for the season - it was refreshing to see so many new happy faces. We had our first for the season - Syndal 11 and GEMSA 6.
There was some excellent batting by Jason, Eve , Iyla and Leon strutting to home base. Christipher caught a ripper foul ball whilst catching, that I think even surprised himself. Sofia and Iyla were our star pitchers striking out various players. Thomas did a good job as center field stopping all the balls and Eve tagged a runner trying to get past her to 3rd base. Emily , Harlow and Elin were also ready to stop any balls that came their way. We had some fast base running by Echo and Howard. Who would have thought that was our first game as a team - the team work, communication and encouragement was amazing. Well done to all that participated

Katrina H

Week 2 - 14th October

Syndal (9)  Vs Falcons (21)

Our first innings didn’t see anyone get on base but our second innings saw us bat much better scoring 9 runs. It was great to see everyone picking at which pitches to swing at, and what to leave. Our baserunning was good, and we will work on that in the coming weeks.

Our pitching went well. We did ok in the field but missing our regular weekly training last week didn’t help. We will work a lot on fielding at training this week.

See you all at training on Thursday at 5pm.

Matt H

Open 1

Week 1 - 7th October

Bye

Week 1 - 10th October 

Rescheduled to a date yet to be confirmed

Week 2 - 14th October

Syndal (5) VS Falcons (4)

And once again Syndal Open 1 wait until the very last moment to change the game!

The first four innings were scoreless, although Falcons did get a runner to third base twice but failed to score. A couple of errors and two hits saw Falcons take a 4-0 lead. Syndal had a fifth scoreless inning as did Falcons in the top of the sixth.

A sixth scoreless inning looked likely for Syndal after the first two batters were struck out, but Courtney Maihi (joining Syndal Open 1 this season) hit a single to right field and reached 1st safely. Audrey Major (also playing in Open 1 this season) ran out to be Courtney’s temporary runner and made it home withthree passed balls, whilst Sarah W walked to 1st. Audrey immediately ran again to replace Sarah as her temporary runner!

An error saw Steph safely at 1st and a great double to centre by Courtnie R (standing in again for Open 1 as she did last year for a few games) scored Audrey for a second time. A strike out next and the inning was over with Syndal still down 4-2 heading into the 7th.

Falcons were unable to get any players on base in the top of 7th so it came down to the batting of Syndal to win or score at least two runs to take the game to a tie break.

Miki Harris was first up and after several fouls connected with the ball and beat the throw to 1st. Then up came Audrey who also connected after two strikes and sent the ball out to right field, almost hitting Miki on the way through, but only the Falcons pitcher appeared to want to claim offensive interference. Two runners now safely on. A strikeout followed, then a walk and a HPB, which brought Miki home. Sarah W came up to bat - she’d already drawn two walks, so could she bring another and score the tying run? Fortunately she didn’t get the chance as a wild pitch sent Audrey running to home, closely followed by Kate jumping on the error made by the catcher.

That was the end of the game, with Syndal winning 5-4.

Syndal had five hits compared to Falcons’ three. Jodi’s single and a double from Courtney are not mentioned above. Plenty of work for both batteries as the strike out count was 12 for Sarah and 16 for Falcons.

Good to see Syndal back on the diamond and great work from a mix of new and old members.

Open 2

Week 1 - 7th October

Raiders (5) VS Syndal (1)

We welcomed a new player Sal to Open 2 for the season. We played ok for a team that had 7 returning players and 2 new players. We fielded well, allowing a few runs in the early innings..

We started ok with the bats, with a few hits but no one reaching base. We had Audrey reach base, and with some great baserunning scored our only run.

Kate and Sal combined well for our battery, even though they hadn't worked together before. The game was closer than the score indicated, and we played dome softball that we can work on.

Thanks to Ella from GEMSA who filled in, making our game possible. She played well at centre field, as well as showing some great baserunning.

Hope to see you all at training this week.

Week 2 - 14th October

Ejays (2) VS Syndal (8)

Open 2 had a great game this week.
We batted really well, and had some brilliant baserunning.

Kate and Mel combined really well to provide a great base for our defence. Our fielding blacked up the battery to only let Ejay's score 2 runs.

Overall it was a really good game. Something to lead us into a promising season.

Open 3

Week 1 - 7th October

Game rescheduled to 6pm Saturday 11th November at Bruiser’s request

Week 2 - 14th October

Ejays (5) VS Syndal (3)

Thanks to Jenny for taking on the role of playing coach this weekend.
.
It was a tough day on the diamond for open 3's first game of the season. Getting our bats going was tough, and no runs were scored in our first batting innings. The opposition however scored 4 runs in their first batting innings.

Our second fielding innings was much better. A great catch by Kate Moorhen at centrefield followed by a flyball to Claire Siracusa at shortstop. Ejays had 2 more safe hits to score another run. We managed to shut them out with a K2 by Jen.

Our next 2 batting innings were much the same as the first. We got 2 runners on base but couldn't convert to runs scored. In our final batting innings we finally found the grass in the outfield. Big hits by Megan Lemmon, Paris Reid Smith and Ashlee Crawford scored us 3 runs. Unfortunately, time beat us and we went down 3 runs to Ejays 5. It was a great effort considering it was our first game with many new faces to our open 3 team. I'm sure over the next few weeks we will find our groove!

Ladder Positions (as at 14th October 2023)

Open 1 - 4th

Open 2 - 3rd

Open 3 - 6th

Under 13s - 4th

Games 21/10/23

Open 1- Monash United (H) vs Syndal (A)

Open 2 - BYE

Open 3 - Syndal (H) vs Monash Stars (A)

Under 13s- Syndal (H) vs Eastern Raiders (H)

If you're not available, please let us know by Thursday 19th October at the latest- by emailing Matt @ syndalteams@gmail.com

Upcoming Night Games

25/10/23 - Open 2 VS Falcons 8:30pm

31/19/23 - Open 1 VS Brandon Heights 7:30pm

Calendar:

Saturday 21st October - Club Duty Day.

Sat 11/11 and Sun 12/11 - U14 State Championships - Frankston Softball Assoc.

Training:

Juniors - Every Thursday night - 5pm to 6pm - Diamond 9
Seniors - Every Thursday night - 6pm - Diamond 9.

Fundraising

We are again participating in the Pancake Parlour Club Rewards Program. Every dollar earns our club 1 point.

If we top our league ladder, we will win $1,000- for our club.

Please ask your friends and family that if they eat at the Pancake Parlour, remember to mention our club when paying and we’ll increase our points.

Unavailability

Just a reminder, that if you’re not available to play any weeks, please let your coach know or contact Matt at syndalteams@gmail.com

Uniforms

We’ll be looking at doing an order for hoodies (both pull on and zip-up) in the next few weeks. We’ll be sending out the information when to hand.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to email me or catch up with Jodi or I at the games on Saturday.