By Bob Fromer
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Surrey, British Columbia, Canada: 22 July – The field was whittled down on Friday to six teams that are still in with a chance to win the Gold Medal at the 2016 WBSC Women’s World Championship, and a similar weeding process has taken place in other brackets at this massive 31-team event.
The GB Women’s Team will get a chance to stay in the tournament and ensure themselves of at least one more game on Sunday when they play Brazil at 12.30 pm local time on Saturday in the bracket that will determine places 9-16.
The Top Eight
The two teams that dropped out of the Top Eight Double Page Playoff after day games on Friday are New Zealand, beaten 8-2 by the Netherlands, and China, who pushed the host team Canada but ultimately lost 4-3.
The Canadians took a 4-1 lead, but China came back against Canadian starter Lauren Regula and cut the gap to 4-3 with single runs in the third and fourth innings. At this point, Canada switched pitchers and brought in Sara Groenewegen, who kept the Chinese off balance the rest of the game with spins and changes of speed to preserve the host team’s slim lead.
Based on the provisions of the WBSC Softball Division Technical Code – a complicated document -- New Zealand will finish eighth and China seventh.
On Friday evening, Japan defeated Mexico 2-0 and the USA defeated Venezuela 7-0 in five innings, with a two-run home run by catcher Amanda Chidester in the top of the fifth inning taking the score into mercy rule territory.
The USA and Japan will meet on Saturday at 5.00 pm in a game that should draw a large crowd for the top match-up in world softball. The winner will go direct to Sunday’s final, while the loser will have to try to use the third place game as a route to the final.
Earlier on Saturday, Canada will play Mexico and the Netherlands will play Venezuela. The losers will be done and will finish fifth and sixth; the winners will play at 7.30 pm on Saturday. The loser of that game will finish fourth; the winner will meet the loser from the US v Japan in the third place game at 1.00 pm on Sunday, and the winner of that contest will get to the Gold Medal game.
The best of the four games played today was Japan’s 2-0 win over Mexico, who started Arizona State star and now National Pro Fastpitch player Dallas Escobedo, who plays for the Pennsylvania Rebellion, coached by former Netherlands and GB Head Coach Craig Montvidas.
The game was a pitching duel between Escobedo and Japan’s Yamato Fujita until the bottom of the fifth inning when Japan’s Yuka Ichiguchi drove a solo home run just over the fence in right centre field. The next batter, Natsuko Sugama, hit a long fly ball that tipped off the glove of Mexican centre fielder Marissa Bravo and rolled along the fence towards the right field line. By the time the Mexicans could chase it down, Sugama had rounded the bases, and those two runs were all Japan needed.
Places 9-16
Only two games were played on Friday in what the WBSC calls a Single Page Playoff that will determine places 9-16 in the world rankings – though it’s really just quarter-finals, semi-finals and a final, where losers are done and winners play on.
Chinese Taipei defeated Cuba 4-1 in the afternoon, and in the evening, Italy had the misfortune to be drawn against Australia, the team no one expected to be in this bracket. Italy actually out-hit the Australians 6-2, and Italy’s Greta Cecchetti outpitched Australian starter Vanessa Stokes and reliever Jocelyn Jeloudev. But one of those two Australian hits was a home run in the fourth inning by the veteran Stacey Porter, and that was the game.
Tomorrow, the two other quarter-finals in this bracket will be played – GB v Brazil and the Philippines v Puerto Rico. The losers, along with Italy and Cuba, will finish in places 13-16.
Chinese Taipei will play Australia on Saturday evening, and the winner will advance to the “final” that will determine ninth place. The winners of the second two quarterfinals will meet at 10.30 am on Sunday morning and the winner of that game will also advance to the “final”.
Places 17-24
Eight teams are participating in a Double Page Playoff, mirroring the Top Eight, to determine places 17-24 in the world rankings. The teams that were eliminated today were France, who lost 5-2 to Guatemala in nine innings, and Uganda, who went down 4-0 to Greece. Uganda will finish 24th and France 23rd.
France played very well against an Guatemalan team that has been better than most people expected, and the score was tied at 1-1 after seven innings. Each team scored in the eighth, with the tiebreak rule in effect, but the French defense fell apart in the top of the ninth to help Guatemala to a decisive three runs.
In other games, Austria shut out Ecuador 13-0 in five innings and the Czech Republic had a four-inning win over Peru by 14-3. On Saturday, Austria and the Czech Republic will meet, with the winner going directly to Sunday’s “final” that will determine 17th place, while the loser will have to try to use the third place game as a route to the final.
Earlier on Saturday, Guatemala will play Ecuador and Greece will take on Peru; the losers will be done and will finish 21st and 22nd; the winners will play each other on Saturday evening. The loser of that game will be done and will finish 20th; the winner will meet the loser of Austria v Czech Republic for a place in the “final”.
Places 25-30
Finally, seven teams, including, in theory, the absent Pakistan, are playing, in effect, quarterfinals, semi-finals and a final to determine places 25-30.
Only one game from this group was played today, with Switzerland defeating India 5-1. But Kenya will gain a forfeit from Pakistan and advance to a semi-final against the winner of Israel v Ireland, to be played on Saturday morning. Serbia gets a bye to the semi-finals and will play Switzerland.
Tournament Notes
Eleven European teams – the most from any one continent – are taking part in these World Championships. Only one, the Netherlands, will finish in the Top Eight and only two – Italy and GB – will finish somewhere in Places 9-16. And we already know that Italy can’t finish higher than 13th.
Interestingly, Italy defeated the Netherlands in the final of the 2015 European Championships – the first time since 2007 that Italy had been the top team in Europe. But the Netherlands, who finished sixth in the 2014 World Championships, will finish at least that high again here in Canada, far above the Italians.
In part this is due to the Netherlands having easier opponents in the second round, though Italy arguably had a softer first round pool. But the Dutch have also played at a higher level in world softball over the past few years than the Italians, and this experience is standing them in good stead.
Europe will have four teams somewhere in the 17-24 bracket and another four in the 25-30 group.
All of this suggests that despite improvements in recent years, European softball still has a long way to go to catch up other world regions in terms of quality of play and international results. The ESF is promoting its new European Coaching Association as one answer to this problem, but not much has happened yet on the ground.
RESULTS
Here are the results from Friday’s games:
CHAMPIONSHIP DOUBLE PAGE PLAYOFF
Netherlands 8, New Zealand 2
Canada 4, China 3
Japan 2, Mexico 0
USA 7, Venezuela 0 (5 inns)
CHAMPIONSHIP SINGLE PAGE PLAYOFF
Chinese Taipei 4, Cuba 1
Australia 1, Italy 0
PLACEMENT DOUBLE PAGE PLAYOFF
Austria 13, Ecuador 0 (5 inns)
Czech Republic 14, Peru 3 (4 inns)
PLACEMENT SINGLE PAGE PLAYOFF
Guatemala 5, France 2 (9 inns)
Switzerland 5, India 1
Greece 4, Uganda 0
Kenya 7, Pakistan 0 (Forfeit)
Serbia gets a bye to the semi-finals