by Bob Fromer
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma: July 25 -- The GB Women's Fastpitch Team took on the Czech Republic this afternoon in the fifth place playoff game at the World Cup of Softball, and the result was an almost routine 6-1 win for GB.
The GB team will take a lot of encouragement from two straight wins over the Czechs here in Oklahoma as both teams now head for Italy and the European Championship/World Championship Qualifier that starts July 31 in Ronchi dei Legionari, about halfway between Venice and Trieste in North East Italy.
Struggling Czechs
The Czech Republic has struggled to hit throughout the World Cup, with a team batting average of well under .200, and in today's game GB starter Megan Brown, who pitched three innings, and Stacie Townsend, who pitched four innings, held the Czechs to just one run on three hits.
That run came in the top of the first inning when a walk, a stolen base, a single and a sacrifice fly netted the Czechs their only tally.
But GB came right back with three runs in the bottom of the first.
Leadoff hitter Kristi Yoshizawa reached first on a bunt single, Laura Thompson walked and Stacie Townsend sliced a double down the right field line to score Kristi. Laura eventually scored on a single by Leah English.
At that point, six batters into the game, with one out and the bases loaded, Czech coach Tomas Kusy took out his starting pitcher, Vendula Draha, and replaced her with Kristyna Kalinova, who had pitched most of the Czechs' 3-2 loss to GB on Saturday. Kalinova got Morgan Parkerson on a line drive to short, but walked Naomi Jones on four pitches to force in GB's third run.
Czechs bearing gifts
The Czech defense, the worst in the competition, committed only one error in this game, but it gifted GB two more runs in the bottom of the second inning.
Kristi Yoshizawa and Laura Thompson led off the inning with singles, but GB eventually had runners on second and third with two outs when Leah English hit a high pop fly to shortstop. Though the wind did blow the ball back towards the pitcher's circle, there was really no reason for Czech shortstop Eliska Cerna-Pojerova to drop the catch. She just did, and two more runs were home.
GB's sixth and final run came in the fourth inning. Stacie Townsend and Karlene Headley-Cooper singled with one out and shortstop Jess Legendre dropped a single into short right-centre field to score Stacie.
Playing out the string
After the score reached 6-1, the Czechs seemed resigned to their fate, and their only two baserunners in the last three innings came on hit batters.
Stacie Townsend's four innings of work -- no runs, no hits, no walks and the two hit batters -- earned her the win.
The real thing
The GB Women's Team will fly to Italy tomorrow morning -- a long journey via Dallas, Madrid and Venice -- in good spirits. Apart from the broken arm suffered by second base player Sarah Jones on Saturday (her sister Naomi has taken over the position and is doing a fine job), everyone is healthy and the team has been lifted by the softball they have played against tough opposition.
The GB Team will finish second in the fielding statistics for the tournament, behind only Japan but ahead of the USA, Canada, Australia and the Czechs, a testament to excellent individual and team play. And GB has some very respectable batting averages against very tough pitching.
But the tournament in Italy is the important part of the summer, and the trick will be to keep the momentum going.
A top three finish in Italy will guarantee the GB Team a place in the 2012 World Championships in White Horse, Canada, an invitation to the 2012 World Cup in Oklahoma, and there will be an assumption that GB will play in the International Women's Division at the Canadian Open Fastpitch Tournament in between.
All GB has to do is qualify -- and then find the money!
US triumph
In the other playoff game for places today, Canada defeated Australia 4-1 to take third place while the Australians had to settle for fourth. But Canada would far rather have won when the two teams played on Sunday night, because a win in that game would have put Canada into the final at the expense of Japan.
Instead it was the USA against Japan once again in the final, played before a large but not a sellout crowd at the ASA Hall of Fame Stadium.
Japan had scored a convincing 7-0 win over the US in the Canadian Open final a couple of weeks ago, but that game had been pitched by Japanese ace Yukiko Ueno. Though Ueno was in the squad here in Oklahoma, and didn't seem obviously injured, she didn't play.
What we got this evening was a long, incident-filled encounter with several controversial umpiring calls, including one where the Japanese third base coach was so incensed that she took herself out of the game. There were also some dubious coaching decisions on both sides.
The US committed four errors, while the Japanese committed their first and only error of the tournament. But the US had more firepower and Japanese starter Makiko Fujiwara dug a massive hole for herself and her team with four straight walks in the first inning that led to two US runs.
The final score was USA 6, Japan 4 after Japan scored two runs in the seventh inning on a dropped catch in left field by Michelle Moultrie and brought the tying run to the plate. But the third US pitcher of the evening, Keilani Ricketts, closed it out when Misa Okubu tried to bunt with two outs and popped a little catch back to Ricketts.
Japan still look like a more talented all-round team, but they need Yukiko Ueno, who won the Olympic Gold Medal for them in 2008, to nullify the US power that GB saw so vividly yesterday afternoon.
As far as this summer is concerned, honours between the two best teams in the world are even.
Previous stories on the GB Women's Team at the World Cup can be found on the Home Page and in the News section on this website.