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(Story by Marco Stoovelaar; Photo by Henk Seppen) Hoofddorp Pioniers wins big twice in Germany Nederlands COLOGNE (Germany) - In the weekend (March 19-20), Hoofddorp Pioniers was in the beautiful city of Cologne in Germany and played against Cologne Cardinals, one of the teams that play in the 1.Bundesliga. As mentioned in the recaps published on Sunday, the Hoofddorp-team recorded two convincing victories. On Saturday, Pioniers won 11-1, on Sunday, the team won 9-2. As promised, more details of these games would be published when available. And here they are. Coming weekend, Pioniers will participate in the Ringvaart Tournament, organized by RCH-Pinguïns in Heemstede. (March 19-20)

Game 1 - Cologne Cardinals vs. Hoofddorp Pioniers (Saturday) In Saturday's game, American Benjamin Meyer started for Pioniers. The righthander, who last year played in the First Division for UVV, threw the first four innings. He walked five batters, but also struckout four. In the fourth inning, he gave up Cologne's lone run in the game. Pioniers initially was kept scoreless in its first two at bats, but then scored twice in the third inning. The team then added seven more runs in the three middle innings. ...Joost van den Bergh homered... ...on the photo, he plays for Storks in 2020... (© Photo: Henk Seppen) In the top of the third inning, Pioniers scored two unearned runs, due to two German errors. With one out, Bodhi de Vreede singled, then both Thom Hoogkamer and Reangelo Willems reached on an error, resulting in the first run. Hereafter, Raul Jacobs produced a runscoring single. Two runs were added after a new pitcher had entered the game in the fourth. With one out and Joost van den Bergh (fielder's choice) on first base, Mark Smit hit an RBI-double. After next batter Jorrit Penseel had walked, Smit scored the next run in a stolen base-situation. Trailing 4-0, Cologne Cardinals scored its lone run in the bottom of the fourth after Meyer had encountered no problems in the first three innings. In the fourth, the German opponent got the bases loaded via an error and two walks. The run was then scored on a passed ball. With the bases still loaded and one out, Meyer followed with a strikeout, then a flyout ended the at bat. After adding another unearned run in the fifth, Pioniers rallied for four runs in the sixth at bat. First, Van den Bergh led off with a homerun. Smit then walked and later scored on a passed ball. With two outs, two more runs were added on doubles by Hoogkamer and Jacobs. Now leading 9-1, Pioniers scored two more runs in the seventh inning, thanks to the contribution of two of its coaches, as Tom van Limburg and Dirk van 't Klooster both got an at bat in this inning. First, Van Limburg (who is the Pitching Coach) led off with walk. After Van den Bergh had walked, Van Limburg scored on a pinch-hit single by Van 't Klooster, who is the all-time hit-leader in Dutch big league-history. Van den Bergh scored the eleventh run for Pioniers on an error. Pioniers Head Coach Mervin Gario briefly played defensively, while second baseman Raul Jacobs was treated for a minor injury. The game was really treated as an exhibition game, as players re-entered (sometimes on other spot in the batting order) and some got extra at bats. Meyer was relieved in the fifth inning by Lars Broersen, who threw the next two innings for Pioniers and was supported with a double play. Thereafter, Koen van 't Klooster (the son of Dirk) took over in the bottom of the seventh and completed the game by throwing the final three innings to earn a save. Van 't Klooster struckout five batters and gave up no basehits, but he saw seven batters reach base. He walked three and hit four others with pitch. In the seventh inning, Cologne left three runners behind for the second time.

Cologne Cardinals - Hoofddorp Pioniers 1-11 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 R H E Hoofddorp Pioniers 0 0 2 2 1 4 2 0 0 - 11 9 1 Cologne Cardinals 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 - 1 4 3 pitchers Hoofddorp Pioniers inn. SO BB H R ER Benjamin Meyer, W 4 4 5 1 1 - Lars Broersen 2 1 - 3 - - Koen van 't Klooster, SV 3 5 3 - - - pitchers Cologne Cardinals inn. SO BB H R ER ??????, L 3 2 1 2 2 - Niklas Piontek 2.2 - 4 5 7 6 Marvin Stockhaus 2.1 3 2 2 2 1 xxxxxx 1 2 - - - - Homerun: Pioniers: Joost van den Bergh (6th,solo,0 outs,off Piontek). Umpires: HP-, 1B-. Scorer-Ingrid Vijfvinkel (Hoofddorp Pioniers). Starting Time-1:00 PM. Time Played-0:00 hrs. Site-Circlewood Stadium, Cologne (Germany). Game Notes: Exhibition game.

Game 2 - Cologne Cardinals vs. Hoofddorp Pioniers (Sunday) It clearly still is the exhibition season, as the pitchers have yet to find the strike-zone. In Saturday's game, seven pitchers walked 15 batters (eight by Pioniers-pitching) and hit six. In Sunday's game, there were 24 walks (both teams had twelve). With that, there was a lot of traffic on the bases. Pioniers opened the score with two runs in the first inning off of starter Cedric Lauffer, then rallied for four more in the third to take a big early lead. In the top of the first, Raul Jacobs led off with a walk and moved into scoring position via a sacrifice bunt by Duco Nuijten. He then scored the first run on a triple by Jeldwin Orman, who later scored himself on a passed ball. In the third, Jacobs again led off with a walk. This time, he scored with one out when Orman reached on an error. Next, the bases got loaded when Joost van den Bergh reached on an infield-hit and Mervin Gario walked. Two runs were added when Jorrit Penseel followed with a double and a sacrifice fly by Duncan Beljaards lifted the lead to 6-0. Off of starter Nick Winkel, Cologne got two baserunners in both the first and second inning (all walked), but they were left behind. Trailing 6-0, the home-team scored its first run in the third. After the bases got loaded via two walks and a single, Winkel had reached his pitch-count limit and was relieved by Lucca van der Schouw. He began with two strikeouts, but then a walk led to the run. Cologne left three runners behind. Pioniers then scored once in each of the next three at bats. In the fourth, Bodhi de Vreede led off with a walk and went on to score on a wild pitch. In the fifth at bat, Van den Bergh led off with a single and later scored on a throwing error. And in the sixth, the lead-off hitter scored again. This time, De Vreede opened with a single. After the bases got loaded, he scored on a sacrifice fly by Jacobs to make it a 9-1 score. After leaving three runners behind again in the sixth (off of Yassir Lachkar) and another runner on third base in the seventh, Cologne Cardinals scored its second run in the eighth inning. Again, two batters walked, then a 2-out single accounted for the run. Nathan Diaby took over in the seventh and also was credited with a 3-inning save. Pioniers, which inserted some additional batters from the sixth inning on, left three runners behind in the ninth inning.

Cologne Cardinals - Hoofddorp Pioniers 2-9 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 R H E Hoofddorp Pioniers 2 0 4 1 1 1 0 0 0 - 9 9 0 Cologne Cardinals 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 - 2 5 2 pitchers Hoofddorp Pioniers inn. SO BB H R ER Nick Winkel, W 2 (*) 2 6 1 1 1 Lucca van der Schouw 2 3 1 1 - - Yassir Lachkar 2 1 1 2 - - Nathan Diaby, SV 3 4 4 1 1 1 (*) - Winkel pitched to three batters in the third inning pitchers Cologne Cardinals inn. SO BB H R ER Cedric Lauffer, L 2 2 2 2 2 2 ?????? 1 1 3 2 4 2 ?????? 2 4 3 1 1 - ?????? 4 5 4 4 1 1 Umpires: HP-, 1B-. Scorer-Ingrid Vijfvinkel (Hoofddorp Pioniers). Starting Time-12:00 PM. Time Played-0:00 hrs. Site-Circlewood Stadium, Cologne (Germany). Game Notes: Exhibition game.

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