Taiwan won the gold medal for the first time in 27 years at the IBAF World Junior Baseball Championship in Thunder Bay, Canada, on Sunday after defeating Australia 8-4.
The last time Taiwan won the championship was in 1983. In subsequent years, the team has finished in second place eight times and in third place six times.
Taiwan played host to the tournament in 1999 and in 2004.
PHOTO: LEITH DUNICK, THUNDER BAY SOURCE
In the first inning of Sunday’s game, Taiwan took a 1-0 lead with two hits and the help of Australian errors. Australia evened the game at 1-1 in the third and then hit a home run in the fourth to lead 4-1.
Taiwan added a point in the fourth inning and retook the lead in the fifth, with Yang Hung-sheng (楊宏聖) scoring and then a homer from Lin Chia-ching (林家慶) that gave Taiwan a 6-4 lead.
In the sixth inning, a double from Lin Tzu-wei (林子偉) led to another two points for Taiwan, who held the lead at 8-4 for the final three innings.
Meanwhile, in Tokyo, Taiwan’s university baseball team lost to defending champions the US 8-7 in the preliminary round of the fifth World University Baseball Championship.
The two teams played out a 6-6 tie after nine innings and in overtime, the Taiwanese team scored one run in the top of the 10th inning. The US, however, replied with runs in the bottom of the 10th and the bottom of the 11th to edge out the Taiwanese.
Taiwan’s manager Yeh Chih-shien (葉志仙) said his team fared quite well, although they made some mistakes.
Yeh attributed Taiwan’s loss to the fact that some of their best players had suffered injuries and that the opposing team was one of the strongest in the competition.
However, Taiwan stand a good chance of winning their next game against Sri Lanka, Yeh said. If they win that match, they will finish third in preliminary round Group A and will next face hosts Japan from Group B.
Group A is made up of Taiwan, Canada, the US and Sri Lanka, while Group B is composed of China, South Korea, Cuba and Japan.
The final of the competition is scheduled for Saturday.
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