By Bob Fromer
Sant Boi, Spain: 27 July – The GB Women’s Team produced their best performance of the European Women’s Championship on Tuesday night in what was arguably their hardest game of the tournament so far, an utterly dominant 10-0 four-inning mercy rule win over Israel.
Because of earlier games running long, the first pitch in a game that was meant to start at 8.15 pm Spanish time in Viladecans was thrown at 10.48 pm instead and the game didn’t end until 12.18 am. But the GB Women, after beating Ireland in the first game of the morning and then waiting almost 12 hours for this game to begin, didn’t seem bothered.
As has become their custom in this tournament, GB attacked the opposition from their very first at-bat and never took their foot off the throttle, scoring in every inning and banging out 15 hits in just four frames.
Meanwhile, GB pitcher Georgina Corrick almost threw her second no-hitter of the tournament, giving Israel just a solitary single on a ball that could have been ruled an error, and striking out nine of the 14 Israeli batters she faced.
In three appearances in the tournament so far, including starts against Germany and Israel and a relief appearance on Tuesday morning against Ireland, Georgina has pitched 10.2 innings and given up just the one hit and one walk while striking out 18.
GB had lost to Israel 8-3 in a warm-up game last week, and Israel may have come into the contest with a certain amount of complacency, sending out Ava Justman to start the game instead of their #1 pitcher, Sydney Goldman. However, Goldman was in the game soon enough after GB scored two runs in the first inning against Justman and another three in the second.
But the pitching change didn’t slow down GB’s momentum, as they added a further run in the third inning against Goldman, and then brought up the four-inning mercy rule total with four more runs in the top of the fourth.
The win gave the GB Women a 3-0 record in Pool E (5-0 in the tournament overall), with two final Pool E games to come today, against Italy at 1.30 pm Spanish time (12.30 pm in the UK) and France at 6.00 pm local time.
The win over Israel has ensured that GB will go forward from this Championship round-robin to the next one, Pool X, which begins on Thursday. But the games against Italy and France remain important because wins and losses against the two other teams that will advance with GB are carried forward, and the record that teams will take to Pool X will be crucial in terms of getting places in one of the medal games on Saturday.
Besides, there is the small matter of GB looking to avenge their loss to Italy in the final of the Olympic Qualifier the last time the teams met in July 2019, and this GB Team, which is growing in confidence as each day of this tournament passes, is looking forward to the challenge.
Relentless
The GB Women have scored in the first inning of every game they have played so far, and they kept that up against Israel to establish crucial early momentum.
In the top of the first inning, Tia Warsop beat out an infield single, Sydney Brown singled through the right side of the infield, Katie Burge bunted the runners to second and third and Kendyl Scott’s sharp single to left centre field drove them in. It was clinical and efficient offense, using GB’s assets of speed and base-hitting ability throughout the line-up, and it put the Israelis under pressure even before they came in to face Georgina Corrick.
Georgina soon sent them back out to the field, throwing hard and setting the Israelis down in order on three swinging strikeouts.
Amy Moore singled to centre to lead off the top of the second inning for GB. Israeli pitcher Ava Justman made a fine diving catch on Aubrey Peterson’s popped up bunt attempt for the first out, but Tia Warsop lined a double to left centre, Sydney Brown singled to left and Katie Burge hit yet another triple – her tournament-leading fifth -- to the wall in left centre field. Three more runs were home, and Ava Justman was out, with Sydney Goldman recording a strikeout and a groundout to get Israel out the inning.
But three more Israelis went down via strikeout in the bottom of the second inning and GB posted another run in the top of the third.
Lauren Evans, who had told herself to wait for a hittable strike after grounding out on the first strike she saw in the first inning, hit a long double to centre field. Lauren moved to third on a passed ball and scored on Georgina Corrick’s hard-hit ground ball that Israeli shortstop Arizona Richie couldn’t handle.
The GB team and coaches were now starting to think of a seven-run five-inning mercy rule win, but the team went one better by scoring four more runs in the top of the fourth inning against an increasingly desperate Sydney Goldman and bringing the total to 10.
Katie Burge – currently leading the tournament in hitting with a .727 average – led off the inning with a single to centre, and Kendyl Scott did her Katie imitation and drove a triple to the wall in right centre. Morgan Salmon then walked, Lauren Evans drove in Kendyl on a sacrifice fly, and Georgina Corrick, Amy Moore and Aubrey Peterson hit consecutive singles to bring that magic number 10 up on the scoreboard.
It only remained for Georgina to set Israel down in order again in the bottom of the fourth inning, and that was that.
Scores and standings
Below are games scheduled in the European Women’s Championship on Wednesday.
Teams in Pool E and Pool F are engaged in Championship playoffs; teams in Pool G are playing for experience and placings.
POOL E
Italy v France
Ireland v Germany
GB v Italy
Israel v Ireland
GB v France
Israel v Germany
POOL F
Czech Republic v Greece
Netherlands v Slovakia
Greece v Poland
Netherlands v Spain
Czech Republic v Poland
Spain v Slovakia
POOL G
Croatia v Turkey
Switzerland v Denmark
Ukraine v Belgium
Austria v Finland
Switzerland v Malta
Finland v Turkey
Austria v Denmark
Standings in the three pools after Tuesday's games are:
POOL E
GB (3-0)
Italy (3-0)
Ireland (1-2)
Germany (1-2)
Israel (1-2)
France (0-3)
GB and Italy are going through to Pool X and France is not. But the third team to go through will be settled today when Israel plays Ireland and Germany and Germany plays Ireland.
POOL F
Netherlands (3-0)
Czech Republic (2-1)
Spain (2-1)
Greece (1-2)
Poland (1-2)
Slovakia (0-3)
The Netherlands are going through to Pool X; who, apart from Slovakia, will join them?
POOL G
Croatia (3-0)
Austria (3-0)
Belgium (2-1)
Ukraine (1-1)
Malta (1-1)
Denmark (0-1)
Switzerland (0-2)
Turkey (0-2)
Finland (0-2)
All GB games during the tournament will be webstreamed, and the broadcasts can be accessed on https://www.youtube.com/wbsceurope for free or on ESport Plus.
Game reports will be posted each day on this website.
Photos by Chris Knoblock