Annual Senior Camp in Janossomorja Starts National Team Season 2010

On the weekend 26-27th June the members of the 2010 senior squad came to Janossomorja to prepare for the upcoming national team events. A fifteen men strong squad worked out on the Rascals-field for two full days under great conditions.

Saturday morning saw the team working on game defense like infield-outfield drills, run-downs, pitcher-fielding-practice. After the lunch break, our men got ready for a friendly-match against the Piratas del Caribes from Vienna. The Piratas are a relatively new club on the Austrian baseball map that entirely consist of players with Venezuelan, Dominican and other latino background. Filled with plenty of baseball experience and passion the Piratas were not shy of the Hungarian team and came out swinging hard at the pitches of the Hungarian staff from the beginning.

Válogatottunk és a kalózok

This passion combined with a slow – sometimes unlucky – start of the Hungarian offence lead to a 0:5 deficits by the end of the 4^th inning. Although behind by five runs, the Hungarians stayed focused and started their offensive run in the 5^th with a solo-homerun by Denes Simonyi. From then on the team showed why they were the favourites in this game and cruised to a concentrated 12:5 win in nine full innings. Overall this game went well and was an important part of the camp because it gave the team the chance to improve and fine tune teamwork in a real game atmosphere.

On Sunday the squad continued the camp from 9am on with more defence/ offence workout, this time with a special focus on game tactics like 1-3 situations, pick-offs, baserunning and bunt-defense. The afternoon session was used to play an inter-squad game before the players parted their ways back home again.

Overall the camp was very successful as it gave plenty of opportunities to improve the team’s tactical and fundamental skills. The squad will travel next to Hluboka nad Vltavou (Czech Republic) at the end of July to compete in the Games of Friendship before competing in the Danube Cup in Janossomorja at the end of August.

Our junior national team takes part in a tournament this weekend in Bratislava, facing the national teams of  Slovakia and Czech Republic.  The roster announced a few days ago has changed as some players quit the national team program on short notice, the final roster for the EC qualifier this summer will be announced after the tournament.

Friday:

G1     June 4        14:00          Slovakia 16 – Slovakia 18

G2     June 4        17:30          Slovakia 18 – Czech Republic

Saturday

G3     June 5       10:00          Slovakia 16 – Czech Republic

G4     June 5       13:00          Hungary – Slovakia 18

G5     June 5       16:30          Czech Republic – Hungary

Sunday

G6     June 6       10:00          Hungary – Slovakia 16

G7    June 6        13:00           *    Final game    *

Softball Danube Cup will happen this weekend in Jánossomorja.

Every year the national teams of Hungary, Slovakia and Austria play for this trophy. As reported last October the Hungarian girls won the Danube Cup the first time ever in 2009. Now is the time to defend the title as hosts this year. Let’s root for our softball national team!

Schedule – Sunday, May 23rd 2010:

09:00 Warm up
11:00-12:45 HUNGARY vs Austria
12:45-14:00 Lunch break
14:00-15:45 Austria vs Slovakia
16:15-18:00 Slovakia vs HUNGARY
18:15 Award ceremony