Thursday 10 August – Rain delayed the start of playoff games today for both the top six and bottom seven teams at the European 
Co-ed Slowpitch Super Cup in Sofia, but when play did begin, GB’s representatives in the tournament kept on winning.
In the Championship round-robin for the top six teams, the first game of the day, which started five hours later than planned, was between the Travelling Dodgers and the Asko Linz Bandits & Witches from Austria, and the game was an unexpectedly close and low-scoring affair through the first four innings before the Dodgers pulled away with 10 runs in the fifth and sixth innings for a 12-5 win.
Next up was H20 taking on the UCE Travellers from Germany. The Travellers had managed only four runs on Wednesday evening in a slightly surprising loss to the Dutch team Textown Tigers, and their offense was subdued in this game as well, with H20 winning by 17-7.
Because of the very late start, the second games of the day for both British teams – the Travelling Dodgers against the Textown Tigers and H20 against Waynes Pardubice – have been postponed until Saturday morning.
Travelling Dodgers 12, Asko Linz Bandits & Witches 5
It might have been that the long delay and the state of the pitch had a dampening effect on this game, but at the end of three innings the score stood at 2-2, and at the end of four innings, the Bandits & Witches held a 4-2 lead.
Neither side scored in the first inning and both teams scored once in the second inning and once in the third.
The Dodgers’ run in the second inning came on a double by Daniel Downes, an infield single by Matt Tomlin, and a fielder’s choice ground ball. In the third inning, Tyler McGoveran led off with a double and eventually scored on a sacrifice fly.
When the Austrians scored twice in the top of the fourth inning to take that 4-2 lead, and the Dodgers went down in order in the bottom of the frame, things were beginning to look serious.
But it was the Austrians themselves who opened the floodgates for the Dodgers in the bottom of the fifth inning.
Three of the first four Dodgers hitters reached base on Austrian errors, which produced two runs, and the next batter, Nick Wingate walked. After that, Areej Elmaazi singled home two more runs and scored on a double by Daniel Downes, and the Dodgers led 7-4.
That was never going to be enough, and a solo home run by Richard Adames Lopez for the Bandits & Witches in the top of the fifth inning cut the lead to 7-5.
But Dodger bats finally got going in the bottom of the sixth: three runs came in a Tyler McGoveran home run and two more on consecutive singles by Nick Wingate, Areej Elmaazi, Daniel Downes, and Sherry Kenyon, to run the lead out to 12-5.
The first two Austrian runners reached base in the top of the seventh inning, but the Dodgers managed a double play on a pop fly back to the pitcher, and a fly out ended the game.
H20 17, UCE Travellers 7
With Roger Grooms pitching for H20 and Wolfgang Walther for the UCE Travellers, neither team did much offensively over the first three innings, at which point the score stood at 4-4. Both teams had scored once in the first inning and managed three runs in the third inning.
A solo home run by Mike MacDowell – the first of three in the game – accounted for H20’s run in the bottom of the first inning, and in the bottom of the third inning, the runs came on a two-RBI single by Megan Beard and a sacrifice fly from Mike MacDowell.
Then, after the UCE Travellers again failed to score in the top of the fourth inning, H20 exploded for nine runs in the bottom of the frame, and that was effectively that.
A two-run home run by Mike MacDowell came late in the inning, but H20 had eight hits in total, two of them by Chelsie Robison, plus doubles by Stewart Butcher and Robbie Studholme, and crucially, the German team committed four errors. The UCE Travellers brought in Max Zerhusen to relieve Wolfgang Walther in the circle midway through the inning, but it didn’t stop the onslaught.
H20 scored four more runs over the fifth and sixth innings and the Germans scored three, but the game had been decided by that nine-run outburst and ended after six innings because time limits had been imposed on games after the rain.
The UCE Travellers now stand unexpectedly at 1-2 in this playoff group, and may struggle to get to a medal game.
Scores and standings
Despite the rain, some play was possible on Thursday in the six-team Championship playoff round-robin, Group E, at the European Co-ed Slowpitch Super Cup, with teams playing for places in the medal games on Saturday.
The teams that finish first and second in this round-robin group will play in the gold medal game, the teams finishing third and fourth will play for the bronze medal, and the teams finishing fifth and sixth will have a fifth-place playoff.
Scores in Group E on Thursday were:
Travelling Dodgers 12, Asko Linz Bandits & Witches 5
H20 17, UCE Travellers 7
Textown Tigers-Eastpro 14, Asko Linz Bandits & Witches 3
UCE Travellers 5, Waynes Pardubice 0
Three other games scheduled for Group E on Thursday, two of them involving British teams, have been postponed until Friday.
Standings in Group E after games completed on Thursday are:
H20 (2-0)
Textown Tigers-Eastpro (2-0)
Waynes Pardubice (1-1)
Travelling Dodgers (1-1)
UCE Travellers (1-2)
Asko Linz Bandits & Witches (0-3)
Tomorrow
Because of the rain and late start on Thursday, the second games of the day for both British teams – the Travelling Dodgers against the Textown Tigers-Eastpro from the Netherlands and H20 against Waynes Pardubice from Czechia – were postponed until Saturday morning.
On Friday, H20 will play Textown Tigers and the Asko Linz Bandits & Witches from Austria, while the Travelling Dodgers will face Waynes Pardubice and the UCE Travellers.