Premier Cricket: Kingston Hawthorn looks for gradual improvement
Coach Ben Williams says the club has no ‘worldbeaters’ but 25 new players have presented for the 2019-20 season.
South East
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It’s understandable that new Kingston Hawthorn coach Ben Williams is making no great claims about the Hawks for 2019-20.
A glance at the ladders from last season gave him an indication of the difficulty of the task he was taking on.
The Hawks finished on the bottom in the firsts and seconds.
They were 17th in the thirds, and 13th in the fourths.
In other words, across the grades wins were as elusive as a shadow.
It’s been a busy off-season for Williams, who built a fine reputation as a coach in New Zealand before relocating to Melbourne early this year.
He said there had been a “clean-out’’ of the squad, and about 25 new players had joined the Hawks.
But he said there were no “worldbeaters’’ and Kingston Hawthorn was not expecting to jump up the ladder.
Williams said he was hoping to see some “individual successes’’ and gradual improvement across the grades.
“The word on the street is that we’ve got a better squad than we put on the park last year,’’ he said.
“But it’s my first season of Premier Cricket so I’ll be seeing how we go. I’m looking forward to feeling everything out, seeing what the standard is like and seeing where we sit after the first two or three rounds, whether we’re getting thrashed off the park or competing or winning. It’s going to be interesting. We haven’t set our goals too high. We’re going to try to build some self-belief.’’
Former Mt Waverley Sub-District captain Alex Deuchar has joined the Hawks and will serve as the First XI captain.
His fast-bowling teammate Jake Rigby has also made the move to Walter Galt Reserve.
Sri Lankan pair Ruwan Sanjeewa, an opening bowler, and Visura Fernando, a big-hitting opening batsman, and Camberwell Magpies wicketkeeper-batsman Sam Newell are other additions.
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Sanjeewa and Fernando are not imports; they live locally and are keen to try their luck at Premier level.
Prateek Patil, an off-spinner, and Thaveesh Attankyake, a top-order batsman, and Nivin Sathyajith, also a batsman, are among the other newcomers.
“There are no worldbeaters,’’ Williams said of the First XI. “We’ll have a reasonably balanced side … my main job in the past few months has been to mould the club … there are a lot of new players across all four sides.
“We cleaned out some fellows who needed to be cleaned out and got some fresh faces in, a lot of young guys.’’
The Hawks last night named their First XI for the Round 1 match against Footscray at Walter Galt Reserve: Lyle D’Rozario, Alex Deuchar, Simo Ivetic, Jack Fowler, Sam Newell, Jake Marnie, Ramneet Dhindsa, Shorye Chopra, Visura Fernando, Prateek Patil.