SpeedBlitz Blues Contracted Players
Friday, June 2, 2006
Cricket NSW has announced its SpeedBlitz Blues contracted players for season 2006-07.
New signings include spinners Beau Casson (formerly WA) and Nathan Hauritz (formerly QLD) who will move to Sydney later this year.
Cricket NSW has recognised the fine performances of several players in the Sydney Grade competition last year.
Scott Coyte (Campbelltown-Camden),Tim Lang (University of NSW), and Grant Roden (Western Suburbs) have all been given contracts for the first time.
Coyte is a 21-year-old right-arm quick who took 59 wickets at an average of 15.46 wickets in grade last year to be the leading wicket-taker in the competition.
Lang is a 25 year-old fast bowling all-rounder who has been a consistent performer in
Grade cricket.
Last summer he took 54 wickets at 17.43 to be second on the wicket-takers list behind
Coyte.
Lang has taken 50 wickets or more for the past two seasons, and was player of the Grade Final in 2004-05.
Roden got a taste of cricket for the SpeedBlitz Blues last summer, making his ING Cup debut against Tasmania last summer and being included in the 13-man squad for the final in Adelaide.
Roden was a standout in the Cricket Australia Cup, taking 28 wickets at 15.17 to be the leading wicket-taker in the competition.
He took two ten wicket hauls in consecutive matches, returning 4 for 57 and 6 for 34 against Tasmania and 5 for 43 and 6 for 72 against South Australia.
The 26-year-old paceman took 35 wickets at 25.60 in Grade cricket, with a best bowling performance of 5 for 38 last summer in grade cricket.
Two new players have been given rookie contracts.
Promising batsman Usman Khawaja (Randwick-Petersham) and David Warner (Eastern Suburbs) have been awarded rookie contracts for the first time.
Khawaja and Warner were both members of the Australian Under 19 World Cup squad.
Khawaja is an opening batsman for Randwick-Petersham, who made 360 runs last
summer with three fifties and a century.
He was named Under 19 Player of the National Championships.
Warner averaged 50 in grade cricket last summer for Eastern Suburbs making six fifties and a century and scoring 650 runs for the season.
All-rounder Moises Henriques has been upgraded to a full-contract after some impressive form in the ING Cup last summer.
Batsman Matthew Phelps and Graham Thorpe have both retired, while Corey Richards and rookie contracted player Jarrad Burke have been delisted.
Nine players received Cricket Australia contracts: Nathan Bracken, Stuart Clark, Michael Clarke, Brad Haddin, Phil Jaques, Simon Katich, Brett Lee, Glenn McGrath, and Stuart MacGill.
The list of SpeedBlitz Blues contracted players is:
Name Age
Aaron Bird 22
Doug Bollinger 24
Mark Cameron 25
Beau Casson 23
Ed Cowan 23
Scott Coyte 21
Murray Creed 27
Nathan Haurtiz 24
Moises Henriques 19
Jason Krejza 23
Grant Lambert 28
Tim Lang 25
Greg Mail 28
Matthew Nicholson 31
Aaron O’Brien 24
James Packman 26
Grant Roden 26
Craig Simmons 23
Daniel Smith 24
Dominic Thornely 27
Rookies
Tom Cooper 19
Peter Forrest 20
John Hastings 20
Usman Khawaja 19
Stephen O’Keefe 21
Martin Paskal 20
David Warner 19