After 2 days of work in Prague both the Confederation of European Baseball (CEB) and the European Softball Federation (ESF) announced a few changes in the chain of command as well as scheduling for this upcoming 2014 international softball season and sites for the 2015 European Softball tournaments.
On hand in Prague as special guests to the event were the International Baseball Federation president (IBAF) and co president to the WBSC, Riccardo Fraccari, along with his other co president to the World Baseball Softball Confederation, Don Porter, the president of the International Softball Federation (ISF), Dale Mc Mann, and finally Jason Holowaty, who was there representing Major League Baseball (MLB).
Krunoslav Karin of Croatia was named the new General Secretary of the Confederation of European Baseball (CEB) by a 28 to 11 vote. As a gesture in remembrance of Xavier Mateu and Mr. Panaye, two members of the European Baseball community that were lost last year, a moment of silence held at the beginning of the meetings. Also being introduced as a new award was the Xavier Mateu Award for Excellence. An award that will be given annually with this year’s recipients excepting the decoration directly from Mr. Xavier’s family. Taking home the honors were Stephanie Winkler (scorer of the year from Germany), Arnoldas Ramanauskas (umpire of the year from Lithuania), Oleg Bokyo (coach of the year form Ukraine), and Switzerland for being the Federation of the year. Also being presented at the meetings was the CEB’s new website which is expected to launched on the 1st of March, along with the new official headquarters of the Confederation in Karlovac, Croatia.
On the softball side of things, ESF (European Softball Federation) announced the calendars for the 2014 European Softball Tournaments, with two very important events, the Cup of Cups (Porpetto) and the Champions Cup (Unione Fermana) to be held right here in Italy, along with the Massimo Romeo Youth Trophy at the under 13 level (Collecchio from the 12 to the 16th). This year’s Junior European Championship will be held in Holland from the 21st to the 26th of July, with Italy finding themselves in group D along side the Czech Republic, Israel, and Denmark. Finally, the last news to come out of the meetings were the 2015 sites for the Youth European Championship to be held in Nuoro, Italy from the 29th of July to the 4th of August, and the Seniors European Softball Championship to be held in Holland from the 20th to the 25th of July.
