Auckland, New Zealand: March 3 -- GB starter Rich Haldane gave up only four hits to defending World Champions Australia today, but also threw in five walks, three of them in the bottom of the second inning when the Australians scored six times. Three innings later, a walkoff home run to left-centre field by substitute designated hitter Mark Harris, leading off in the bottom of the fifth inning, gave Australia a 7-0 mercy-rule win over Great Britain to leave GB still without a win at the ISF Men's Fastpitch World Championships.
The equation is now simple for a GB Team that came to Auckland with high hopes: win the remaining four games against Indonesia (0-3), South Africa (1-2), perennial European Champions the Czech Republic (2-1) and the United States (0-3) -- or they will almost certainly be going home.
Offensive drought
Australia scoring seven runs may have made GB's offensive output largely irrelevant in this game, but the ongoing offensive drought is going to be the biggest worry for Head Coach Russ Snow as GB goes into those last four round-robin games, the first of which, against Indonesia, will be played at 11.00 pm tonight UK time.
Once again, GB was only able to muster two singles -- by Ryan Martin leading off the fourth inning and by Rich Haldane leading off the fifth -- against Australia's ace fireballer Adam Folkard, who struck out 12 and didn't walk a batter. As Folkard had pitched the day before against Indonesia, GB had expected to face the Aussie #2 Andrew Kirkpatrick, who throws only slightly less hard. But Folkard it was in the circle, and in general, he mowed the GB hitters down, striking out the next three hitters after giving up each of those hits.
Australia did allow a third baserunner when designated hitter Luke Peters, leading off the top of the second inning, reached on an error by Australian third baseman Jeff Goolagong. But Peters was then picked off first base.
So GB has only been able to muster no runs and only seven hits -- six singles and a double -- in the first three games of the tournament, and 33 out of 57 GB outs have come on strikeouts. Though the three teams faced so far have arguably been the toughest in Pool A, GB will need to find more offense if they are to have any hope of further progress in the tournament -- and tonight's game against Indonesia looks a good place to start, as the Indonesians gave up 11 runs today to Samoa.
But -- and a warning to GB -- the Indonesians scored 10 in reply!
One bad inning
One bad half-inning was GB's downfall in this game, and it came in the bottom of the second, after Rich Haldane had retired Australia comfortably in the bottom of the first on just 14 pitches, with one Aussie reaching base on a hit-by-pitch.
Again following a GB pattern in this tournament, Australia's second-inning rally began with a four-pitch walk to leadoff hitter Jeff Goolagong. Left fielder Tim Crome sacrificed Goolagong to second, but when shortstop Nick Norton lined out to his opposite number, Steve Hazard, there didn't seem to be much of a threat. But then the roof fell in.
Pitcher Adam Folkard singled to drive in Goolagong, centre fielder James Todhunter walked, and first baseman Michael Tanner singled to score not only Adam Folkard but the fleet-footed James Todhunter all the way from first base.
Todhunter had already shown his speed with a great diving catch in centre field to rob GB's Ryan Martin on the first play of the game.
Right fielder Joel Southam then unloaded a triple to drive in Michael Tanner, designated hitter Zenon Winters walked (and was replaced by Mark Harris), and then a pair of errors, by GB second baseman Ryan Martin and first baseman James Chalmers, allowed Joel Southam and Mark Harris to score while enabling Aussie second baseman Nick Shailes to reach first.
Mercifully, Shailes was then picked off base to end the inning.
No way back
There was never going to be a way back from 6-0 down against Adam Folkard and Australia, but GB pitcher Rich Haldane recovered to shut Australia down in the third and fourth innings. One batter in each inning reached on a walk, but Rich struck out three over the two innings and catcher Kevin Stockford gunned down yet another runner trying to steal -- his third in three games.
But the end came quickly in the bottom of the fifth inning when Mark Harris, having replaced Zenon Winters as the designated hitter, belted a 1-2 pitch over the fence in left-centre to bring the mercy rule into effect.
Following Australia's second inning outburst, GB Head Coach Russ Snow took the opportunity to get a number of players their first taste of World Championship action. And Rich Haldane, by pitching the whole game, has given GB ace James Darby a valuable rest day before the must-win games to come.
Scores
Here are the results from games played on Day 3:
Canada 6, Mexico 0
South Africa 5, USA 3
Samoa 11, Indonesia 10
New Zealand 7, Japan 2
Argentina 5, Philippines 0
Australia 7, Great Britain 0
Colombia 6, Netherlands 1
Venezuela 7, Czech Republic 0
Standings
The standings after three days of play (the top four teams in each pool will make the playoffs) look like this:
Pool A
Australia (3-0)
Samoa (3-0)
Venezuela (3-0)
Czech Republic (2-1)
South Africa (1-2)
Great Britain (0-3)
USA (0-3)
Indonesia (0-3)
Pool B
New Zealand (3-0)
Canada (3-0)
Argentina (2-1)
Colombia (2-1)
Japan (1-2)
Mexico (1-2)
Netherlands (0-3)
Philippines (0-3)