Jagot and Thornton to Receive Sellars Scholarship

Businessman and philanthropist, Mr Basil Sellers AM, will tonight present scholarships to 9 up-and-coming young cricketers to support their dreams of one day representing NSW and Australia.

Businessman and philanthropist, Mr Basil Sellers AM, will tonight present scholarships to 9 up-and-coming young cricketers to support their dreams of one day representing NSW and Australia.

The presentation will take place at the Sydney Cricket Ground and will be attended by Mr Sellers, with current NSW Blues and Australian batsman Steve Smith as guest speaker.

Since 2006 the Program has supported 78 cricketers. Of these, Phil Hughes, Usman Khawaja, Mitchell Starc, Steve Smith, Pat Cummins, Ellyse Perry, Alyssa Healy and Erin Osborne have gone on to play Test cricket for Australia, with Sam Robson recently making his Test debut for England.

In addition, a total of 25 scholars have represented either NSW or another State in the Sheffield Shield or Women’s National Cricket League.

2014 SCHOLARSHIP RECEIPIENTS

Riley Ayre: Club/Region: Sutherland/Central Northern
Ashleigh Gardner: Club: Bankstown Sports
Mikayla Hinkley: Club: Penrith
Tom Jagot: Club: Randwick Petersham
Bayley MacGill: Region: Newcastle
Jonte Pattison: Club/Region: Sydney University/Central Coast
James Psarakis: Region: Central Northern
Lauren Smith: Club/Region: Northern District/Central Coast
Henry Thornton: Club/School: Randwick Petersham/The Scots College

For full profiles on all players, please see the attachment.

Cricket NSW Chief Executive, Andrew Jones, congratulated the recipients of the scholarships and also thanked Mr Sellers for his ongoing support of NSW cricketers.

“Being awarded a Basil Sellers Scholarship is a wonderful opportunity for these young players. Not only will it help ease the financial burden of pursuing their cricketing dreams, it will also assist them in furthering educational and career opportunities outside of the game. This, in turn, will develop them into well rounded individuals,” said Jones.

“Cricket NSW is most grateful to Basil Sellers for his continued support of the Scholarship Program. He is an extremely generous man and we are indeed fortunate to have Basil supporting cricket in the way he does.”

About the Basil Sellers Scholarship Program

The Basil Sellers Scholarship Program was born after a chance meeting between Basil and the then Australian wicketkeeper, Adam Gilchrist, in 2004.

Since 1985, Basil Sellers had been sponsoring the Country Boys Coaching Class, a program that had been running since the 1950s that brought talented junior players from regional NSW to Sydney for clinics.

Adam Gilchrist was one of the beneficiaries of this class when he was 15-years-old and one of his memories from the clinics was receiving a Speedo t-shirt from Basil! 17 years later, when their paths crossed again, Gilchrist recounted the story of this presentation to Basil and expressed his thanks for the opportunity the Coaching Class had given him. It was a gesture that certainly left its mark on Basil who was thrilled that his sponsorship had had such a wonderful effect on the career of one of Australia’s most exciting cricketers.