Five Canadian Officials to Represent WBSC at Tokyo 2020 Olympic Summer Games
Ottawa, Ont. – Softball
Canada is very proud to announce that two working umpires and three
technical officials have been assigned to the Women’s Softball
competition of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games by the World
Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC). Softball Canada Level V umpires
Frankie Billingsley (Edmonton, Alta.) and Geneviève Gaudreau
(St-Hubert, Que.) are two of the thirteen umpires who will be calling
the games on the field during competition, while Softball Canada past
president
Kevin Quinn (Charlottetown, P.E.I.) has been named Technical Delegate,
Roberto Perez-Leon (Delta, B.C.) will be a Technical Commission (TC) Director and
Bob Stanton (Fredericton, N.B.) was appointed as the Umpire Director.
“We are very grateful to the WBSC for placing their trust in these
strong individuals for the 2020 Olympic Games, the highest level of
competition in our great sport” stated
Scott Neiles, President of Softball Canada. “These
appointments show the strength of our umpiring program, our success in
developing top international umpires, and our organization’s ability to
produce quality people. Kevin, Roberto and Bob
are well respected in the international softball community and we fully
support their involvement. We are extremely confident in the abilities
of all of these officials and that they will represent our sport with
great pride.”
The WBSC notified officials of their selection on Monday.
Billingsley and Gaudreau have accumulated plenty of international
experience that has led to their assignments. Billingsley umpired at the
last two WBSC Women’s Softball World Cups (2016 and 2018) as well as
the 2019 Pan American Games and WBSC Americas Softball
Qualifier, while Gaudreau is a current member of Softball Canada’s
Officiating Development Committee (ODC) and worked the 2014 and 2016
Women’s World Cups, the 2015 Pan American Games and the 2019 WBSC
Americas Softball Qualifier. Both Billingsley and Gaudreau
will umpire at the upcoming U18 Men’s Softball World Cup in New Zealand
next month.
“We are so proud of Gen and Frankie. The Olympic Games are the pinnacle
of sport and they have both earned this appointment through their hard
work and commitment to excellence over many years” added
Jeff Whipple, Softball Canada’s National Director of
Umpires. “With Bob’s leadership, Frankie and Gen’s appointments to Tokyo
2020 provides a beacon to follow for young umpires across the country
and two amazing role models for young women
in our program. All three of them are world class individuals.”
The Games of the XXXII Olympiad Tokyo 2020 will take place from July 24
to August 9 in Japan, with the Women’s Softball competition scheduled to
be played from July 22-28. The first two days of competition will be
played at Fukushima Azuma Baseball Stadium
and the final four days will move to the Yokohama Baseball Stadium.
Both diamonds will be converted for softball. This will mark softball’s
return to the program after being left off following the Beijing 2008
Games.
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For more information, please contact:
Gilles LeBlanc
Manager – Marketing & Communications
Softball Canada
p: (613) 523-3386 ext. 3105 |
m: (613) 795-1996
w:
www.softball.ca | e: gleblanc@softball.ca