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MUMBAI: The Otago Volts Champions League Squad has assembled in Dunedin to begin preparations for the inaugural Champions League Twenty20 to be held in India between the 8th and 23rd of October.
The twenty man squad minus those on BLACKCAPS duty (Brendon McCullum, Ian Butler, Neil Broom & Nathan McCullum) and Dimitri Mascarenhas and Neil Wagner (still overseas) began preparations with a meeting and fielding session at the University Oval on September 1. The squad of 20 will be trimmed to a travelling group of 15 on Friday the 4th of September, however all 20 will take part in preparations for the month of September.
The squad have a busy schedule for the month of September with skills training at the Indoor High Performance Centre at the Edgar Centre and on the newly installed artificial surfaces at the University Oval. The team?s trainer, Chris Donaldson, will also be busy taking the team through and intense strength and conditioning programme.
Practice matches start with internal fixtures amongst the squad in Oamaru on September 14 & 15 and continue with club cricket pre season Twenty20 games in Dunedin on September 19.
Community Events also form a big part of the programme with an appearance at Carisbrook for the Otago vs Auckland game, a schools visit to North Otago, a local cricket road show featuring modified games of cricket at some high profile Dunedin?s locations, players present at all Dunedin Junior Cricket registrations and the farewell lunch with Sir Richard Hadlee as guest speaker in the Town Hall as examples of events in the programme.
The squad will leave Dunedin for Brisbane on the 25th of September where they will play warm up games against the Queensland Academy and South Australia as well as having use of the Allan Border fields and facilities for a week of training. On the 2nd of October the squad will leave for India where they will have a further two warm up games in Hyderabad before their opening tournament game on the 10th of October.
Otago Cricket CEO Ross Dykes said, "this is the start of what will be one of the most exciting eight weeks in the history of Otago Cricket. Our intention is twofold:
to have a programme that will give the squad the very best preparation for a successful tournament against the world‘s best, and to give the players a sporting experience that will live with them long past their playing days."
