KARACHI: The 3rd Irene Pearl School and College Women’s Softball Championship will commence here on Monday at the Trinity Girls College Ground. The three-day event is being organised in collaboration with the Sindh Softball Association (SSA). “The four houses of the school and two teams of the college section will be taking part in the event,” an official of the SSA said here on Friday. He said that those who perform well would be invited for the coaching camp for the national softball team. The secretary general of Softball Federation of Pakistan (SFP), Asif Azeem, along with principal Irene Pearl distributed softball kits among the players at a ceremony on Thursday. Asif said that schools and colleges played a key role towards promotion of any game and steps were being taken for improving the infrastructure of softball in the country. He also praised the contributions of Irene Pearl for preparing six teams of softball at the college and the school level. Irene thanked the SFP and SSA officials, particularly Saleem Rajput and Zeeshan Merchant and coaching committee head Faraz Ejaz, for their support in holding the softball events and for grooming players for the sport. She expressed hope that by working hard and excelling in the sport, the players from her school and college would soon be representing the national softball teams in major tournaments.