By Melinda Daniels and Neil Teague
Friday 4 August – The GB Under-18 Women’s team entered the final playoff round at the European Under-18 Championship in Prague with a chance of getting to a medal game, but losses to the Netherlands on Thursday night and to Ireland on Friday morning have put paid to those hopes.
The GB Team will have a final game on Friday evening against Italy, but whichever way that goes, it’s already been confirmed that the British team will finish in fifth place in the tournament and will not have a game to play on Saturday.
Regardless of the outcome of the final round of games to be played among the top six teams on Friday evening, we also know at this point that the Czech Republic and Italy will contest the gold medal game on Saturday evening at 7.00 pm, after the Netherlands and Ireland have played the bronze medal game on Saturday at 2.00 pm.
The three teams that emerge with medals will also have qualified for the WBSC Under-18 Women’s World Cup Group Stage tournaments to be played in 2024.
GB v Netherlands
Thursday night’s game between GB and the Netherlands was a close and well-pitched affair, with GB’s Elena Clark-Wilson matched against Lizzy Kwakernaak for the Dutch. Elena pitched five-and-two-thirds innings and gave up only three hits, while Kwakernaak pitched all seven innings for the Dutch and gave GB four hits.
But the four GB hits – singles by Jessica Chan, Kaitlyn Parisi, Jenna Thompson and Emma Smith – were scattered, and with no walks being offered by Lizzy Kwakernaak, GB never had a runner beyond second base.
The game was scoreless until the bottom of the fourth inning, when the Dutch scored a single run on a hit-by-pitch, a stolen base, and a single, and it remained at 1-0 until the bottom of the sixth inning, at which point the Dutch scored three more times off Elena Clark-Wilson and reliever Saige Sampson to put the game away.
The GB Under-18s had fought the Dutch toe-to-toe throughout the game, but came up just short.
The result meant that GB’s game against Ireland on Friday morning had become a must-win affair if the GB Team hoped to play in a medal game on Saturday.
GB v Ireland
When GB and Ireland had met in Group D in the tournament’s opening round-robin, Ireland inflicted GB’s only defeat in the group by a score of 8-5, but game was always close and the GB Team was always in it.
That wasn’t the case on Friday morning when the teams met again in Group, with a place in the bronze medal game on the line.
Ireland got off to the best possible start in the bottom of the first inning, taking advantage of two hit batters and a walk to load the bases, at which point Irish pitcher Andrea Hegarty helped her own cause immensely by hitting a bases-loaded home run over the fence in left centre field to give Ireland a 4-0 lead.
GB responded immediately in the bottom of the first inning. Jessica Chan led off with a long triple to right centre field, and scored a few moments later when the Irish catcher attempted a pick-off throw and the ball sailed into left field.
But that was the last time GB came seriously close to scoring. They had baserunners in most innings thanks to two more hits, some walks, and some Irish errors, but in every case Andrea Hegarty closed the door, notching nine strikeouts in the process.
George Wilson took over the pitching in the second inning from starter Elena Clark-Wilson, and Saige Sampson came in at the start of the fourth inning, but the Irish continued to hit the ball, collecting 10 hits overall and scoring three more runs each in the second and third innings.
The last two innings were scoreless, but the deficit was too big for the GB Under-18s to make up. They tried the mount a final rally in the bottom of the fifth inning when Jessica Chan singled with one out and Kaitlyn Parisi reached on a fielder’s choice where the Irish got no outs. But a pop fly to second base and a strikeout ended the game.
Scores and standings
Play in Group X, the final Championship round-robin where the top six teams in the tournament are fighting for places in Saturday’s medal games, got underway on Thursday night, continued on Friday morning and concluded on Friday evening.
Scores were:
THURSDAY EVENING
Ireland 18, Ukraine 0
Netherlands 4, GB 0
FRIDAY MORNING
Ireland 10, GB 1
Italy 14, Ukraine 5
Czechia 4, Netherlands 0
FRIDAY EVENING
Netherlands 6, Ukraine 3
Italy 17, GB 7
Czechia 7, Ireland 0
Final standings in Group X, including results of played games brought through from the previous round-robin groups, were:
Italy (5-0)
Czechia (4-1)
Netherlands (3-2)
Ireland (2-3)
Great Britain (1-4)
Ukraine (0-5)
While the teams in Group X have been fighting for places in the medal games on Saturday, the 12 teams that didn’t make the Championship playoffs have been playing for places 9-20 in the final standings. All results from these games can be followed on the WBSC Europe website.