Country Aussie Rules footy is doing it tough with drought rendering many grounds unplayable, but you’ve really got to feel for Tatong, in the Benalla and District competition, who had 26 men unavailable for their round 5 clash against Bonnie Doon.

The reserves fought hard with Tatong scoring a two goal win but then all but four of the reserves players had to back up to play another four quarters in the seniors game, the result, understandably, was not so close: Bonnie Doon  43.18 (276)  def Tatong  3.4 (22).

Bonnie Doon congratulated the Tatong boys for having the courage to play on and not choose to forfeit the match; It’s great fighting spirit and sportsmanship. Despite that round’s aberration Tatong are placing third and second in the senior and reserves ladders, respectively.

To the round ball, and the wine belt of Southern Western Australia has joined the Vault. Fourteen clubs represent the South West Soccer Association and Country Women’s Soccer Association, playing around Busselton, Manjimup and Margaret River.

The SWSA switched to the ResultsVault system after their season had commenced and they have done a stellar job setting up their competition online, concurrently launching a brand new SportzVault 360° site at the same time: http://southwestsoccer.sportzvault.com/

In smaller round ball news, Queensland, where the fun never stops, is currently enraptured by the Warehouse cricket winter season.  Over 200 clubs are playing in 33 divisions in and around Brisbane and to the north at Geebung, and further still, heading up towards the Sunshine Coast, at Burpengarry and the Glasshouse Mountains. On the eastern coast games are played on Russell Island, South West towards Ipswich at Redbank and around Surfers Paradise at Helensvale. The season wraps up early August.

Everyone’s favourite winter Olympic sport, Curling, is closer to becoming a Vault friendly sport, with the Toronto Cricket Skating and Curling Club joining the Toronto and District Cricket Association for the summer conference series, round two matches are about to get underway in the three divisions.  And over the Queen’s Birthday weekend the Aussie Touring Team is about to take on Toronto CC, in the Straggler’s league.

Also in North America, the Great Lakes Cricket Conference, based in Michigan, hosted the 2008 United States Cricket Association Central East Regional tournament over the Memorial Weekend holiday period.  Six leagues converged on the lakes district for a three day round robin tournament, with the Midwest Cricket Conference beating the defending champs International Cricket Management League.

The winter season is under way, with Aussie Rules, Football, Baseball and even Cricket happening live on the vault across Australia and overseas.

First to Australian Rules, Round 4 in the Ovens and Murray league, where the 2007 premiers met last year's wooden spooners. Wangaratta Rovers proved their premiership status over Myrtleford at the WJ Findlay Oval, final scores: The Hawks 23.22 (160) to the Saints 4.5 (29).

And the biggest margin for the weekend was in the first Round of the Central Murray Football League, in the seniors, with Leitchville Gunbower trouncing Lalbert 37.25 (247) to 1.1 (7).  If you're in the north of Victoria on Saturday, head to Cohuna for the local 'derby' (Lalbert are in the West Coast Eagles colours and Cohuna the Docker's strip) and give Lalbert some well deserved encouragment.

The Foxtel Cup, Football Federation of Victoria's premier league, is nine rounds in.  South Melbourne are having a fickle season, last weekend bagging 6-2 against Fawkner Blues at Bob Jane Stadium, their best result since Round 3, when they obliterated Western Suburbs 5-0, giving them their second win for the season.  South Melbourne are sitting 10th on the ladder, despite four games with no score, the club is hoping to notch up another victory, against Altona Magic, on Monday night.

Football Brisbane have 36 divisions, from Men's Premier League to Junior's Under 16's, currently playing. In Premier League, Brisbane Wolves scored 2-1 to Souths United; Wolves' Clulow scored an Own Goal. And in Under 15's North Pine had a blinder with 13 to Mt Gravatt's 0.

Forget the IPL, cricket is still being played in Australia. The Northern Territory season has commenced, with the Darwin and District Cricket Competition. There are eight divisions from A grade, through to a Women's league and two juniors.  Seven clubs are playing for the VB Mid Cup, plus a Twenty/20 competition will also run concurrently, from mid May.

And a little further north, at the other NT, our friends at the North Texas Cricket Association are almost half way through their United States season. Recently taking out the bowler of the week award was Bobby Martin, in B Grade, playing for Longhorns, Bobby had a haul 4 for 28 against NTCA Youth.

Cricket Australia announced today a partnership with Melbourne based online sports management company, InteractSport, to provide a national online cricket management system, to enhance administration and statistics gathering for players at all levels.

During the announcement, Australian cricketer Michael Clarke endorsed the partnership:
“It’s an exciting step for cricket and for all community players out there who, in this system, will be treated the same as international cricketers. It means that if you’re playing in your local Under 12’s team you can compare your statistics and results with not only your team mates and opponents, but every other Under 12 player in the country.”

InteractSport initially developed the ResultsVault Cricket system in 1999 for the use of a handful of Melbourne based cricket clubs. It now services more than 2200 cricket organisations world wide involving more than 190,000 players. The details and statistics from over 280,000 matches is available online covering clubs from Bunbury to North Texas, Glenorchy to Rotorua and Emu Plains to Durban.

InteractSport Director, Andrew Walton, says:
“After an extensive process it is a great honour for us to be selected by Cricket Australia to provide the online systems that will power the national cricket management solution. This will be the biggest and most comprehensive program of its kind in sport in Australia and the end result will be a world class platform that will encourage the growth of the sport at the grassroots level.”

Cricket state bodies will be strongly encouraging community clubs to register their interest for the ResultsVault system prior to next season, to utilise the online system’s features including: registrations, fixture generating, full score cards, player statistics, ladders, team communication and media reports.

Cricket Australia Chief Executive Officer James Sutherland stated:
“Partnering with InteractSport to implement a National cricket management solution will ensure that Australian cricket continues to meet the future challenges, ease the increasing administration burden at all levels and co-ordinate our resources more effectively within the game. Online competitions, results and statistics is also an ideal medium to bring diverse communities together to celebrate cricket. We are delighted in this outcome to strengthen the relationships that exist in Australian cricket.”

Are you an experienced .NET Web programmer, preferably with a keen interest in sport? Like to join Australia's leading provider of web based sporting management solutions? If so, we'd be interested to hear from you as an opportunity has just opened up at our Melbourne offices.

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To further cement InteractSport as a market leader in providing online sports management services, it has been selected to deliver the online software for the World’s Best Putter event soon to be launched to the public in Australia. 

The Professional Golfers’ Association (PGA) and their members will host and manage competitions for club members and visitors to find who is their Club’s Best Putter.  These champions progress through to state finals and then onto a spectacular televised national final competing for the title of Australia’s Best Putter with prize money of A$100,000.

Australia’s Champion is invited to compete against other champions from around the world, all vying for the World’s Best Putter title and US$1 Million in prize money.

The Australian component of the worldwide competition will commence early 2008, featuring television, radio and print media coverage, alongside substantial online interactivity.

InteractSport is hosting all competitor registrations, and the publishing of results for events beginning in January, 2008. The competition is open to all golfers and non golfers - amateur and professionals, with no age or gender restrictions. No handicap is necessary.

Golf clubs can register their club now through the PGA Events Division on (03) 8320 1999 or emailing worldsbestputter@pga.org.au.

Public registrations will be accepted from December 1, 2007 either through their club or online at  http://www.worldsbestputter.com

World’s Best Putter was devised and created by Steve Dundon, President of WBP and Chief Executive of the television production company, Cornerbox Pty Ltd, which has produced shows including The Lost Tribes, Surf Patrol, The Wedge, Dirty Deeds, Search for a Supermodel and many more.

Please be advised that InteractSport has moved to new offices as per the following details:

Level 1, 33 Bank Street, South Melbourne, 3205, Vic, Australia

Tel: +61 3 9696 8010
Fax: +61 3 9696 8012

InteractSport and ProWess Sports have entered into a partnership to deliver a hi-tech, ball-by-ball scoring solution for grassroots cricket throughout Australia for the 2007/08 cricket season.
 
The partnership will result in the provision of ProWess Sports cricket scoring platform that will be modified to seamlessly integrate with InteractSport’s leading online cricket management solution,  ResultsVault.  Clubs at all levels will be able to use an electronic scorecard to score the match ball-by-ball and automatically upload results and player statistics to ResultsVault and their own websites.  Using a wireless Internet connection clubs will also be able to provide a “live scoring” facility on their website.
 
"This marks a new era in how domestic sporting clubs will record and manage their match results and statistics" said Gundy Mantinieks, CEO of ProWess Sports.  “Previously, this type of fully integrated solution was only available to professional level sports and we are excited about the prospect of rolling out similar solutions for AFL, Soccer, Hockey, Rugby and Netball.”

Once results and player statistics are uploaded to the ResultsVault online service anyone will be able to view match results, updated ladders and statistical reports.  This is the final piece in the puzzle for tracking cricket results and statistics that will empower clubs at all levels to provide a professional level of information to their members. With over 1500 cricket clubs currently using the ResultsVault online service we are seeing grass-roots players who have more detailed career records available online than what you can find for Ricky Ponting!

To register interest for your club to receive further information please contact InteractSport 

InteractSport is pleased to announce an exciting partnership with online sporting equipment retailer SportsEquip (http://www.sportsequip.com.au/) that rewards sporting clubs with rebates based on the purchases of all products by their club members.

All sporting clubs will be able to sign up to the Club@ssist package which includes:

• access to sporting equipment online at Market Best Prices, with purchases made by club members giving the club a rebate of up to 7.5% of the purchase price
• unrestricted access to the soon to be released 'ResultsVault LITE' product, including participant management and access to communications features such as bulk email and SMS
• a FREE SportzVault LITE website
• current ResultsVault Cricket and Football customers receive automatic membership

As a special introductory offer, membership of Club@ssist is FREE.

"This partnership continues our intent to provide real value for grass roots sporting clubs and associations. Given that the members of sporting clubs spend considerable amounts each year on sporting equipment, clubs that channel purchases through SportsEquip will be able to earn a significant return that contributes towards operating costs or to reduce player subscription fees." said InteractSport Director, Andrew Walton.

"Over several years, it is becoming evident that clubs and associations using ResultsVault are achieving healthier financial outcomes along with improved standards of operation and management. In addition, overall costs are being reduced, volunteer time savings are achieved and involvement from new volunteers is forthcoming.”

“This new offering makes the connection to ResultsVault an even stronger value proposition as it places economic control with the club or association." he said.

More information about Club@ssist is available at http://www.sportsequip.com.au/t-clubsignup.aspx.

The weekend saw the first full round of matches in the FFV for all senior grades.

To find details on games in the FFV, customise the site by clicking the FFV Results link in the "Red Search For" box and then click the Matches menu to either select the detailed Fixture and Results or the Round Results option.

Complete Ladders and Statistics are also available via the menu link at the top of page.

If specific club information is required, use the Search function to customise the site for the club, follow the prompts in Search or read the Help menu for further details.

Fixture information for Junior competitions will be online shortly.

The Football Federation Victoria is pleased to announce a partnership with InteractSport to provide the ResultsVault Football service to all clubs involved in the FFV Leagues for season 2006.

ResultsVault Football is an online competition management service that has been developed to service football clubs at all levels across all leagues. The many features include detailed match results and statistics, automatic ladder calculations, player performance, match reports, contact management (email and SMS), player registration, referee allocation and media reports. The FFV trialled the service in 2005 and following its success expanded the arrangement to cover all competitions in 2006.

“We are pleased that our relationship with InteractSport has resulted in a comprehensive yet simple online system that will provide value to all of our member clubs,” says FFV Information Technology Manager Tony Persoglia. “Having a quality information service that delivers a standard platform across all levels from juniors to seniors ensures our clubs are operating professionally with the best possible efficiency. The reports and data outcomes are essential for the overall management of the FFV and the fact that the service is inclusive of referees (match allocations, performance assessment and communications) means that we have a complete online service for all FFV stakeholders.”

ResultsVault Football is based on the hugely successful ResultsVault Cricket service now subscribed to by over 1500 clubs and 130,000 players in Australia, which is rapidly growing overseas in emerging cricket markets such as the USA.

“InteractSport is a leading provider of online sports management solutions, having been involved with cricket since 1999. Our philosophy is to reduce manual processing, to be simple to operate, save time, and to deliver a professional information service to grassroots sporting organisations– this has been achieved again with ResultsVault Football,” says InteractSport Director Sales & Marketing Andrew Walton.

For more information, please contact:
Andrew Walton - InteractSport
Tony Persoglia - Football Federation Victoria

Regional football leagues in Bunbury, Western Australia and Gippsland, Victoria are the latest to join up to use ResultsVault Football for 2006.  Interest in football throughout Australia has increased dramatically since Australia qualified for the World Cup in Germany later this year and it's showing in increased numbers of juniors wanting to play the game this winter.

After 18 months in development ResultsVault Football has been launched for 2006.  ResultsVault Football offers a comprehensive online administration service for clubs and associations and is set to do for football as ResultsVault Cricket did for cricket.

We'd like to thank all those involved during the pilot program conducted during 2005 and everyone who gave us feedback along the way.  We are committed to evolving the product in the coming years based on the needs of our users and are committed to offering the best competition management system for football available anywhere in the world.