Stalwarts honoured for carnival

All divisions within the upcoming Mid West junior cricket talent carnival have been named in honour of three longstanding Geraldton Junior Cricket Association officials.

The carnival, which will be held on December 9 and 10 at GBSC Sports Park, will involve players from Carnarvon, Geraldton and North Midlands.

Current association president Kim Ingle believes there will be several benefits for the players at the carnival.

“The kids learn more from each other than they do from coaches, so if they are playing against stronger players, they will improve,” he said.

There will be three divisions across the weekend — Joanne Starling under-12s, Courtney Keeffe under-14s and Norm Jupp under-16s.

All three were on hand at the Recreation Ground for the announcement, where they were congratulated by Mid West Cricket Board chairman Gerard Marquis.

Jupp and Keeffe, two former association presidents, were humbled by the announcement and both were excited about how the new concept would embrace players across the whole region.

Starling, an indispensable junior sport administrator in cricket and football, is still involved with the association — and Keeffe was quick to praise her work ethic.

“When I took over as association president from Norm, he had pretty much done everything on his own, which was a lot of work,” he said. “We went to a bit more of a committee situation with every-thing and Jo and I sort of took over things and she has been running all of the hard things of junior cricket since.”

Marquis said all three officials were also parents of players who had gone through the talent carnival system at various stages, which gave them an added personal interest in the tournament.