Head Coach Beth Perkins and Team Manager Julie Spittle have announced selections for the London Cubs Under-13 Girls’ Fastpitch Team that will travel to Collecchio, Italy to compete in the European Softball Federation’s annual Massimo Romeo Youth Cup from 12-15 August.
The selections were made after trials conducted in conjunction with London Sports on 17 and 30 May.
The team will be training every Saturday through 8 August, with the tournament starting in Italy a few days later.
Ten teams
Ten teams have entered the tournament this year, including three from Russia, two each from Italy and the Czech Republic and one team from Bulgaria, Poland and Great Britain.
The Massimo Romeo Youth Cup is not an official European Championship, because countries are allowed to enter more than one team, and can enter both national and club teams. Instead, the event is designed to allow as many young players as possible in the Under-13 age group to experience European competition.
The GB Under-13 programme has sent two teams to the competition in the recent past – a GB Under-13 Team and a development team, the London Cubs -- but in 2014 and this year, one team has travelled as the London Cubs.
GB teams have often struggled in this tournament for lack of experience, particularly with regard to pitching, but it is still valuable for our young players at the age group to compete in an international environment.
Players and staff
The players chosen for the London Cubs for the 2015 Massimo Romeo Cup are:
Ella Bruce
Annabelle Earlandson
Eliza Esiri
Rosie Esiri
Madison Gledhill
Camilla Fritz Inger
Ellen Jacobsen
Kristen Kohler
Campbell Lazar
Sophia Michaelides
Michelle Shaw
Jasmine Lee Tin
Natalie Vann
Jessica Woodhams
Three non-traveling reserves have also been chosen in case injury or other circumstances force someone to drop out. They are:
Clair Gooch
Claire McGarry
Josephine Morley
Staff members who will be making the trip to Italy include:
Head Coach
Beth Perkins
Team Manager
Julie Spittle
Assistant Coach
Nadya Pavlova
Assistant Coach and Physio
Jodie Rushin
New players
This year’s team consists largely of new players, with only Kristen Kohler, Rosie Esiri and Michelle Shaw returning from the team that travelled to Italy in 2014. Unfortunately, two other players who took part last year, Lily Ferragamo and Natalie Vann, would have been selected to travel but were unable to come.
Kristen Kohler will be one of the team’s main pitchers, and Michelle Shaw and Eliza Esiri have been working hard on pitching during the spring. Other pitchers and catchers may emerge during the training period, since most of those who pitched or caught last year have aged out or are otherwise unable to make the trip.
Team Manager Julie Spittle said: “Our hopes this year are to build a team that works together, encourages each other and enjoys themselves while out on the diamond. We have a lot of new players again and so we will be training hard to get the girls ready for this tour. The aim is to come home from the tour with a squad who are happy because they have done their best and possibly achieved goals that maybe they didn't think they could. Wins are always good, but as long as the players have fun and enjoy the learning journey and adventure they have embarked on, then it will be a success.”
Schedule
The tournament will start out with two pools of five teams playing an initial round-robin.
The top two teams from each pool will play a Page Playoff to determine the medals. Meanwhile, the bottom three teams from each pool will combine into a single six-team group and play a round-robin to determine final standings, with results from games already played in the opening round-robins counting.
As a result, the London Cubs are likely to play a total of seven games over the four days of the tournament.
For the opening round-robin, the Cubs will line up in Group B, along with Italy 2, the Czech Stars, Gepardy Zory from Poland and Moscovis from Russia.
Group A will consist of Italy 1, GBU Moscomsport and Moscovia Marino from Russia, Joudrs Prague from the Czech Republic and Akademiks from Bulgaria.
On the opening day of the tournament, Wednesday 12 August, the London Cubs will play the Czech Stars at 11.15 and Gepardy Zory at 16.45.
On Thursday, the British team will have an early start with a game against Moscovis at 9.00 before finishing their round-robin schedule against Italy 2 at 13.30.
Anyone who fancies a few days in Italy supporting the London Cubs (Collecchio is on the outskirts of Parma) can contact London Cubs Team Manager Julie Spittle for more information.