Saturday, June 18, 2011

Perth Wheelcats start their season on a roll

One of WA's most successful sporting teams begins their season this weekend - The Perth Wheelcats.

Western Australia's wheelchair basketball competition is a force to be reckoned with in the national competition with the Wheelcats winning the last five consecutive national league competitions.

Wheelcats team captain Justin Eveson, who also happens to be the number one ranked wheelchair basketballer in the world, spoke to 720's Alex Hyman before their first game for the season this weekend.

"We've got one of the better leagues in Australia here; it's renowned around the world for producing some pretty good players."

ABC's Alex Hyman had an attempt at the sport, but needs a lot of practice and was obviously no match for the Wheelcats.

"There is a lot of skill involved. You've got to control the wheelchair, which is a specialist piece of sport equipment, and control the ball while the other team is trying to steal it off you."

Eveson also plays for the Australian wheelchair basketball team, which is the number one team in the world at the moment, and his passion for basketball started at a young age.

"I'd always played basketball as a kid before I had my accident. Once I recovered from that - I had a lower leg amputation - I got involved in wheelchair sports and through that I continued my passion for wheelchair sports."

The sport is always after more public interest and the media are helping by getting on board with coverage.

"It's getting bigger and bigger every year. ABC really got on board with the Paralympics, we've got a lot of radio stations and community news that are involved with us but we really want to ramp that up," Mr Eveson said.

"So for anyone that's got a bit of an interest outside of AFL football then we'd love to have you come down."

The Wheelcats season starts this Saturday at the Herb Graham Centre, 27 Chesterfield Road, Mirrabooka.

Tipoff is at 7pm so get along a bit earlier and support this fantastic team.


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