The Prince Albert bid committee is hoping its reputation can help secure the 2024 World Cup following the successful hosting of the 2018 World Juniors. (file photo/paNOW Staff)

By Glenn Hicks

world ball

P.A. wants 2024 Men’s Softball World Cup

Aug 10, 2020 | 5:07 PM

Prince Albert wants to host the top softball tournament in the world in four year’s time.

Felix Casavant, the co-chair of the committee that has been set up to bid for the 2024 Senior Men World Cup, says the successful hosting of the World Juniors back in 2018 has given the city and the local organizational capacity an excellent reputation at the highest levels of the game.

“We’ve done it before and we did a really good job with it,” Casavant told paNOW. “I know that World Baseball Softball Congress (WBSC) officials have been in contact with our committee since 2018 and would love nothing better than to come back to Prince Albert in 2024.”

The tournament features only the best teams who come through a play-off system, along with the host nation.

“You’re looking at 12 of the best softball teams in the world coming to our city, so it’s not like we had with the World Juniors where some of the teams were pretty weak,” he explained.

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Hosting an event of this stature doesn’t come cheap, but Casavant pointed out the key infrastructure that was built for 2018 is already in place — the Max Power Ball Parks — so around $1 million was being budgeted as opposed to $3 million for the previous event. A legacy contribution of $100,000 from the profitable 2018 championship will be added to the funding drive and the committee will seek additional monies from the city’s Destination Marketing Fund, and various grants from the likes of Saskatchewan Tourism and Saskatchewan Lotteries.

He figured ticket sales revenues would also be healthy.

Felix Casavant with the 2024 Senior Men Softball World Cup bid commitee speaks to city council Monday. (Nigel Maxwell/paNOW Staff)

“Our gates should be higher than in 2018, because this is the most elite softball in the world,” he said.

If Prince Albert is to secure Softball Canada’s endorsement for the 2024 event it must first fend off a bid from St. John’s, Newfoundland. Casavant said the next step would then be to win against any other bidding city at the WBSC congress in the fall.

The committee has requested the City of Prince Albert’s support with funding from the Destination Marketing Fund, human resources, use of the ball diamonds and the Art Hauser Centre as the main organization/administrative hub for the event.

At Monday afternoon’s P.A. city council executive committee meeting councillors were unanimous in their praise for what the group achieved in 2018 and approved the issuing of a formal letter of support they can add to their bid with Softball Canada.

Editor’s note. This story has been amended to correct the spelling of Felix Casavant’s name.

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glenn.hicks@jpbg.ca

On Twitter:@princealbertnow