(Story by Marco Stoovelaar; Photo by Henk Seppen)
   Team Europe and Samurai Japan will meet again in 2024
Nederlands
 PULLY (Switzerland) -
The World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC) and Nippon Professsional Baseball (NPB) on Monday (November 20) announced that the Global Baseball Games will return again next year.
On March 6 and 7, Samurai Japan and Team All Euro will meet in the second edition, which will take place in Osaka (Japan).
Both games of the 2-game series will be played in the Kyocera Dome, the home of NPB-club Orix Buffaloes.
60-year old Italian Marco Mazzieri has been named Manager of the European All Star Team by the WBSC.
Mazzieri is the former Manager of the Italian National Team and led La Squadra Azzurra to the European title in 2010 and 2012.
He currently is the chairman of the WBSC Coach Commission.
Hirokazu Ibata was named Manager of Samurai Japan, the National Professional Team of the country.
He was named in October and also will lead the team during the Premier12 next year.
The 48-year old Ibata is a former second baseman/short stop, who played in the NPB for Chunichi Dragons (1998-2013) and Yomiuri Giants (2014-2015).
He also was one of the coaches of the latter in 2016-2018.
During the 2020 Olympic Games, Ibata was a member of the coaching-staff of Japan.
He also has been the Manager of the Under-12 National Team.
The first edition was organized in March 2015 and the games were then played in the Tokyo Dome.
Back then, Belgian Steve Janssen was the Manager of Team Europe.
In his 8-member coaching-staff, Mazzieri then was the Bench Coach.
In 2015, Janssen was the Manager of the Netherlands and had captured the European title in the previous year, while Mazzieri was the Manager of Italy.
Japan was led by Manager Hiroki Kokubo.
In 2015, the Netherlands was represented by 15 players on the 28-man roster.
Only two players from those fifteen are still active, pitcher Shairon Martis and catcher Dashenko Ricardo.
Italy had six players on the European roster.
The other seven came from Spain (4), Germany (2) and France (1).
Initially, former Major Leaguer Andruw Jones was one of the Dutch players on the roster, but he had to withdraw.
He was replaced on the roster by a Czech player.
In the first game, on March 10, Japan nipped Europe 4-3.
Initially, Europe led 3-0 halfway the fourth inning.
Japan then scored once and turned the game around with a 3-run rally in the eighth inning off of relievers Loek van Mil and Shairon Martis.
Rob Cordemans had started and threw the first two innings.
The next day, more than 23,000 spectators saw Europe win with a 6-2 score.
Highlighting that game was a 3-run homerun by Yurendell de Caster.
Europe took an early 5-0 lead after three innings and starter Diegomar Markwell was the winning pitcher.
In November 2016, the National Teams of the Netherlands and Mexico participated in the Samurai Japan Warm-Up Games in Tokyo.
Both countries then played a 2-game series against Japan.
(November 21)
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