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Chess
OTAGO/SOUTHLAND SECONDARY SCHOOLS’ CHESS TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP 2018
On 16 June, the Southland Boys’ High School Chess Team consis ng of Atlas Kerr, Dylan Lee, Jimmy-Lee Wilson and Shannon Kerr, travelled to John McGlashan College in Dunedin to take part in the 14th Annual Otago/Southland Secondary Schools’ Chess Team Championship.
Last year was their rst year of compe ng in this event, nishing 10th with a score of 10.5 points out of 28.
This year, with only one of the four team members having played in the event before, they performed excep onally well. They witnessed a big improvement in results, and nished 5th out of the 14 teams, with a score of 17.5 points out of the 28 points available (an impressive 67% improvement in their points total, from last year). SBHS were just half a point behind the 3rd and 4th placed teams, of Logan Park (1) and Kavanagh College, and nished 2 points behind the 2nd placed team, James Hargest College.
SBHS did extremely well, considering
many of the schools taking part have long established chess programmes with chess tutors at their schools, and were taking part for, in some cases, the 14th year running. Otago Boys’ High were the defending champions, having won the event for seven straight tles.
Southland Boys’ High School has a large number of boys who play Chess in the school Library at intervals and lunch mes. A number of these boys also joined Friday night chess, organised by the Invercargill Chess Club.
Cricket
1ST XI CRICKET
Recently the SBHS 1st XI cricket team
took part in the 1st XI Cup tournament in Dunedin, which involved the top six 1st
XI’s in Otago and Southland playing a 3
day tournament. Our team was seeded 3rd for the tournament, based on last season’s results. We played Waka pu High School in our rst match of the tournament. Waka pu had quali ed through a T20 tournament and came in as the 6th quali er. We had played them earlier in the season
in Queenstown and they were a tough side, who were strengthened by the inclusion of two Otago age group players. Captain Sean Withy won the toss and sent Waka pu in on a slightly damp surface. Sean took three quick wickets to have them in trouble 4 runs for 3 wickets. This slide con nued as Waka pu ended all out for 52 runs in 28 overs.
Bowling gures for our side were:
get through to 225. The rain then fell and we hoped that whatever happened would bene t our side. Unfortunately this wasn’t the case and we had to try to chase down 187 in 32 overs.
Captain Sean Withy got a solid 35, but the team struggled to hit the ball to the big boundaries on the wet out eld and Kings’ deserved the win. Our side has now gone 4th, 3rd and 2nd in the tournament, so I am sure the boys can go one step further next season. We have had a great season overall. We won the Queenstown U17 tournament, competed really well in senior club cricket, the 2nd XI won the Combined Country Division 2, we beat Shirley Boys’ and drew with Kings’ and Otago Boys’ in the inter- schools and then nished 2nd in the Top 6.
Can I please thank all the parents that have supported and worked with the teams and our coaches over the cricket season. Special men on goes to Simon Culhane, who has been brilliant with the 2nd XI all season and Jason Domigan and Hamish Skelt for working and playing with the 1st XI. Shaun Fitzgibbon has lead
the Year 7/8 cricket at school and spent many hours coaching and o cia ng over the season. This work provides our future 1st XI boys, who progress up through the teams at school. Without all these people we wouldn’t have cricket in the school, so thank you for your commitment to cricket.
Ian Mockford
SOUTHLAND BOYS’ HIGH SCHOOL CRICKET TOUR TO NEW DELHI, INDIA
At the end of Term 3, 2018, a tour group of 12 players and 10 adults travelled to New Delhi to train, play and explore. A er a long me fundraising and looking forward to the trip, it was great to nally board the plane. A er nearly two days we arrived in New Delhi and had to begin to adjust to the 35 degrees and high humidity.
We stayed in the Hotel Suncourt Yatri in Karol Bagh, which was ideal for our group, having decent rooms and good areas for the group to hang out a er our long days. No pool, but we had access to one around the corner and then in the hotel next door.
A er se ling into New Delhi we made a trip in our bus (which was prone to going the wrong direc on!) to visit Sethi Sports where the boys were in cricket heaven, buying lots and learning how to nego ate on the price.
We had three days training where the boys had the opportunity to get to know what the condi ons were like in New Delhi. We trained with Gyan Cricket Academy which was based 10 minutes (if we were lucky) from the hotel. Rolled clay without any grass and the ball turning square at mes! It was a tough experience for some of the boys. Our academy coach Saurav did his best to get to know the boys and give them all some advice and things to work on, both
Sean Withy Hayden Hart Jed Mockford Alec Mathieson
6 overs 10 overs 8 overs 3.5 overs
3 for 11 2 for 11 1 for 19 4 for 11
This represented an excellent bowling return with all boys performing. The bowling of Alec was excep onal as he nished the innings by bowling full and straight and
he relied on seam movement to get players out. Our ba ng has been our ‘achilles heel’ this season and we needed to start well on a di cult wicket. Ken Singleton got us o to a great start scoring 20 o 19 balls, but when he fell we began to lose wickets at regular intervals. Benji Culhane steadied the ship with 14 not out and we reached the total 6 wickets down. So objec ve number 1 was achieved, moving into the semi- nals. I did feel for Waka pu who had played well to qualify for the Top 6, only
to bat poorly in their rst match. They are
a good side though and defeated Waitaki Boys’ in the 5th vs 6th place match and Waka pu automa cally qualify for next season’s Top 6.
Our semi- nal match saw us play John McGlashan College who were the 2nd seeds. We had lost to them at last year’s tournament, so it was going to be a close match. Bowling rst we bowled them out for 93 runs, with Alec Mathieson again taking 4 wickets. Our ba ng looked a
li le shaky in the chase, but Benji Culhane and young Aaron Hart se led things down to have us on track. A hat-trick from John McGlashan once again raised the stress levels and it was up to Hayden Hart and Jed Mockford to see us home in a very tense nish. Hayden used his experience to hit the right balls to the boundary. Making
the nal was a great achievement for this young group and win or lose I was proud of what the boys had achieved throughout the season. Playing Kings’ in the nal we again bowled well, but Kings ba ed sensibly to