(Story by Marco Stoovelaar; Photo courtsey of WBSC)
   Japan captures Under-23 World Title
Nederlands
 MONTERREY, Nueva León (México) -
Japan has captured the World Championship-title on Sunday (November 7) at the World Cup Under-23, which was held in three Mexican cities since October 28.
While this was the second edition of the global tournament, Japan became the first-ever World Champion in this category.
The first edition, held two years ago in Taiwan, was a tournament for 21 years and under.
On that event, host Taiwan won the title with Japan finishing in second place.
In the all-deciding Final on Sunday-evening, Japan trailed 3-0 halfway the fourth inning and was outhit 10-7 by Australia.
However, the Asian squad rallied for four runs in the bottom of the fourth inning, then decided the game by scoring five runs in the sixth at bat.
Australia was held scoreless after the fourth inning.
In the afternoon, South Korea won the Bronze Medal by winning 5-3 against Panama.
Japan, which is ranked number one on the World Ranking List of the World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC), initially faced an early deficit.
Australia is ranked in 13th place on the WBSC-list.
After two scoreless innings, Australia opened the score in the top of the third inning off of lefthanded starter Taiga Kasahara.
Samuel Kennedy led off with a single, then Ben Leslie followed with a double.
With one out, both scored on a single by Aaron Whitfield.
In the third inning, Australia raised the lead to 3-0 on a homerun by Zachary Shepherd, who plays in the organization of the Detroit Tigers.
Australian starter Nicholas Veale held Japan scoreless in the first three innings.
Veale gave up his first basehit in the third, but then saw Japan turn the game its way in the bottom of the fourth.
Two costly errors then led to four unearned runs.
With one out, an error, single and walk loaded the bases.
An error on a possible double play-grounder by Koki Yamashita then led to two runs and narrowed the deficit to 3-2.
A sacrifice fly then tied the score at 3-3.
Moments later, a single by Tomya Kakinuma made it 4-3 in favor of Japan.
In the sixth inning, Japan rallied for five more runs, highlighted by a 3-run homerun by Taishi Hirooka.
...Japan celebrates the World Championship-title...
(© Photo courtesy of WBSC) |
Yusuke Masago, who plays for the professional Fukuoka SoftBank Hawks, was named Most Valuable Player of the tournament.
In the Championship Round, Japan suffered its lone loss of the event, 3-2 against Panama.
Australia was led in this tournament by Tony Harris, who was the Assistant Coach of Manager Jon Deeble of the Australian National Team during this years Baseball Week Haarlem, the international tournament in Haarlem (Netherlands).
Now, in México, Deeble was the Bench Coach of Harris to look himself at the talented young players in the Under-23 squad.
One of the players in the team, Jacob Younis, also was in Haarlem.
Chinese Taipei (Taiwan), which finished in seventh place, had the same coaching-staff in both Haarlem and now in México, led by Manager Chien-fu Kuo Lee.
Twelve of the players who now played in the World Cup also played for the Taiwanese squad in Haarlem.
Making its debut in a World Championship was Austria.
The team lost all its eight games, which included some big losses, but it gained points which count for their ranking on the WBSC-ranking list.
Austria opened with an 8-1 loss against Australia.
Hereafter, it lost big to Argentina (13-3), Nicaragua (15-0) and Japan (16-0).
But hereafter, Austria lost only 3-0 to Chinese Taipei.
In the following Consolation Round, Austria lost to the Czech Republic (14-7), South Africa (9-3) and Venezuela (15-3).
The win against Austria was the second in the event for the Czech Republic.
In the preliminary round, the Czechs won 12-4 against South Africa.
They began with a 6-1 loss against South Korea, but also lost big to Panama (17-3) and México (14-4).
The Czechs closed the preliminary round with a 13-12 loss vs. Venezuela.
In the Second Round, the Czechs opened with the win against Austria, but hereafter, lost to Argentina (9-2) and Chinese Taipei (10-0).
Final Standings
1. Japan, 2. Australia, 3. South Korea, 4. Panama, 5. México, 6. Nicaragua, 7. Chinese Taipei, 8. Venezuela, 9. Argentina, 10. Czech Republic, 11. South Africa, 12. Austria.
(November 7)
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