Sport
5 August, 2021
Goats new skipper eyeing off finals
TERANG all-rounder Tyson Hay is looking forward to the biggest test of his cricketing career.
TERANG all-rounder Tyson Hay is looking forward to the biggest test of his cricketing career.
The 22 year-old will captain the Goats division one side this South West Cricket season after taking over the reins from former leader Sam Munro.
Having spent his entire cricket career at Terang, Hay said he was thrilled to finally be given the opportunity to lead the club.
He added he was eager to build on Munro’s work and continue to press the club forward.
“I’m looking forward to it because it’s a club I’ve been involved with since my junior career,” Hay said.
“We started talking about the role halfway through last year because I knew Sam was looking to step aside.
“I had a few come up for a chat and they asked if I was interested and I was fortunate enough to take it on.
“Since I’ve been appointed I’ve definitely been very keen to get started with the season because all I want to do is continue the development of our players into the higher levels of cricket, so to say I’m excited is an understatement.”
Hay said he believes Munro laid the foundations for the club to push into finals calculations this season by investing in the club’s younger players.
While they have done the hard yards in the past few seasons, the new skipper believes his side is already tracking in the right direction.
“Definitely in the latter half of last season we started to gel as a team and as a club so I’m not really going to change much,” Hay said.
“I’m going to be looking to build on that but hopefully we can make finals because we haven’t made them for the last three, four, five years.
“We also want to build our youngsters back up and give them more experience.”
Hay is hopeful the likes of Jake Flynn, Liam Balcombe and Liam Geary become permanent fixtures in the division one side.
He is also excited to watch the progress of Tyson Royal and Billie Baxter, two of the club’s most promising players.
“Tyson won the under 16 Cricketer of the Year at the club and is still only 16 but he is one of our juniors that we are looking to develop his skills a bit more,” Hay said.
“It’s the same with Billie too, he’s an off-spinner that hasn’t bowled much in recent seasons so I’m sure he’s keen to develop his game too.”
As for how his side will approach each of its games, Hay said league followers can expect to see the Goats be more batting-oriented.
“Sam made us try and be a bit more attacking with the ball by bowling outside off-stump and I’ll be doing the same but I’ll also be focusing on the batting side more,” he said.
“Particularly with our middle order, we’ve had big collapses there so I’m hoping to change that up and help the players learn the game a bit better so we can try and put on a bigger total.”