It’s the silly season

Local star Ruwantha Kellepotha has signed with Casey-South Melbourne after a stint with Berwick. 232575 Picture: ROB CAREW

By Nick Creely

It’s been a busy start to the silly season for new Casey-South Melbourne head coach Will Carr.

The Swannies have been busy with the pen as they look to strengthen its list after a largely promising Premier Cricket season that resulted in a 15th placed finish, however there was plenty of talent that made significant improvements.

Understanding the need to bolster its list with more experience to complement its youngsters, the Swans have added Luke Shelton – a left-arm spinning all-rounder with an imposing record for Mosman in the Sydney Premier Cricket competition – with Shelton taking 33 wickets in the season just gone to go along with almost 200 runs.

He’s also been a dominant figure in the Darwin cricket competition for many years.

Carr said that the experienced campaigner not only adds significant amount of class on-field, but will be an invaluable asset for the club’s emerging stars.

“Luke’s a private cricket coach by trade, so he’s really looking forward to working with our younger guys and knowing that we’ve got a lot of young spinners was something that was really enticing to him,” he said.

Carr added that Shelton was already pretty well established at the club, with a number of close connections making the move an exciting one.

“He’s got some long-term friends at the club, Jackson Fry and Cal Dodson – Luke’s played around the country a bit, he’s played in Darwin, Tassie, Sydney, but they’ve remained good friends throughout,” he said.

“Luke was always keen to come back to Melbourne at some stage, and the opportunity to play with his mates was another thing that attracted him to come back, and to our club.

“He’s looking forward to playing with his mates, but to inject that experience and knowledge not only into our first grade, but our club overall.”

After much speculation that he would make the plunge into Victorian Premier Cricket, the Swans have also brought in Berwick superstar Ruwantha Kellepotha – part of Carr’s Turf 1 premiership team in 2019/20.

Kellepotha strolled to the prestigious Alan Wookey Medal as champion Turf 1 player in the season gone, crunching 375 runs at 37.5 and snaring 43 wickets at 11.9 in a season to remember.

The 29-year-old has also played 20 First-Class matches in Sri-Lanka, where has snared 55 wickets and also scored a century.

Carr said there was many reasons to be excited by the leg-spinner’s arrival to Casey Fields.

“First-class experience, a seasoned professional, and a skill set that is going to be important to not only our group, but a skill set that’s a bit of a rarity at Premier Cricket level,” he said.

“He’s a skilful leg-spinner that can bat through the middle, so his attributes are very exciting – to bring that skill set into the mix is huge. We expect him to go very well in all formats of the game, he adds something special.”

The Swans have also welcomed back talented batsmen Joel Mitchell from Moe and Luke Manders from Outtrim Moyarra Kongwak, with the pair expected to significantly strengthen the batting stocks.

Mitchell has 25 first XI games at Premier level with five half-centuries, while Manders made a sparkling 159 against Fitzroy-Doncaster in 2016/17 and is a quality top-order batsman.

“I had a bit to do with Joel, but saw enough to know he’s an exciting talent, he’s still only 21,” Carr said.

“For him last season playing back at Moe was a good thing – he had the opportunity to mature in his own game, and understand his own game, he made some big hundreds.

“He’s also a really good fielder, so he brings some depth to those areas.

“I haven’t seen Luke play before, but he’s part of that group of mates with Cal Dodson, Jackson Fry and Luke Shelton – he was keen to return anyway but that was even more incentive.

“He’s really getting himself ready to go.”

While Carr said that while he was comfortable with the list, with basically all of the core first XI players locked away next season, the club was still well and truly on the hunt.

“We’re pretty comfortable, but you’re naïve to not have an eye out there to see what else may be available,” he said.

“We’re probably looking to add to our fast-bowling depth if the right person was out there – we’ve got some exciting young quicks, but they may be another season away from being first XI players.

“We’ve had a chat with a few guys, but not close to signing anyone just yet – we’ve got an eye and an ear open, so we’re looking around.

“That’s the same with the batting – if the right top-order bat presents themselves, we’ll be happy to have that discussion.”

Carr said there was plenty of exciting young talent at the club they were looking forward to continue working with.

“We’re excited about what we’ve got coming through our own grades,” he said.

“There’s some exciting young quicks in Ev Allaway and Justin Lambden who will be a year older, we’ve got a couple of good young bats, Atharv Deshpande in particular, Harrish Kannan, so there’s some great young prospects.

“Ash Adihetty had a breakout year, Isaiah Jassal got some good experience in first XI and had a solid season.

“We’re mindful of not hindering their development.”

Carr said that the club was also quietly confident that boom youngster Ashley Chandrasinghe has what it takes to go to the next level.

“It’s a great story, it’s a testament to the guy with how hard he works,” he said.

“We’re riding the wave, front and centre in his cheersquad of how he goes, and how far he can go.

“It’s anyone’s guess whether he gets a contract – we don’t have a good line of sight into how these things unfold, but we can only speculate based on his numbers, and they’re as good as anyone’s for a guy of his age.

“Twenty games, an average of 50, you’d be hard-pressed finding anyone who has been able to achieve that.”