Inverell's Taine Riley is hoping for more indoor cricket opportunities in the future after representing NSW Country at the Indoor Cricket National Championships.
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After some strong performances for Inverell in the inter town competition against teams like Port Macquarie and Newcastle, Riley made his way down to Newcastle for selection trials.
"We all sort of played together as a team and they looked at our performance from that," Riley said.
Following a good showing at the trials, the 19-year-old was good enough to get selected for the under-21s men's NSW Cyclones Country side to compete in the National Championships that were held in Melbourne from June 30 to July 6.
It was the first time Riley had been selected in a state indoor cricket squad.
"It was really good, bit of a step up obviously, representing your state," he said.
Up against some strong competition, NSW Country won four of their nine games on their way to a fifth place finish.
Riley was reasonably happy with the result but knew his side could've done better.
"Some of us didn't step up when we needed to but overall it was a pretty good result. The teams that beat us were definitely better than us but we could've beat them on our day."
Riley appeared in six of NSW Country's nine games, and made a solid contribution each time he took to the court.
He ended the week with 32 runs to his name to go with seven wickets, highlighted by taking two wickets apiece in games against Queensland and Western Australia.
Riley was happy with his own personal performance considering he didn't have much training leading into the event as he's now based in Grafton.
"I think I went alright. I was a bit under prepared because I don't actually live in Inverell at the moment, so I don't have a local centre to train.
"I didn't have any preparation, I just played. So I could've done better in that regard but other than that I think I did alright."
Following the tournament, the Australian squad was selected, where NSW Country's captain was selected.
Riley is just hoping it isn't the last time he gets to represent his state.
"I've got a couple more years in that team (under-21s) where I can continue to get selected so I'm hoping to get that," he said.
