A stellar effort by the Brother Elephants bullpen helped protect a slim lead as they held off a late-game rally to defeat the Sinon Bulls 4-3 at the Taipei Municipal Baseball Stadium in Tianmu on Sunday evening.
With a 4-3 lead and the Bulls hitters rallying for more, Elephants reliever Wang Jing-li was able to induce an inning-ending pop-out with runners at the corners in the sixth. He then retired the side in order in the seventh before Matt Perisho and Mai Jia-rei combined for a scoreless eighth and ninth to preserve the win for starter Liao “the Golden Submarine” Yu-cheng.
The Elephants’ Chen “the Golden Warrior” Chih-yuan and Wang Jin-yong both had RBIs to cap a three-run fourth for a 4-1 lead.
The Bulls attempted a comeback, but failure to come up with timely hits ultimately cost them as they batted a disappointing 2-for-11 with runners in scoring positions.
Hsieh Jia-shien’s leadoff double off Perisho in the top of the eighth was wasted as the next three Sinon hitters came up empty against the American lefty, while Chang “Prince of the Forest” Tai-shan’s game-ending groundout to short with runners on first and second added another pair of stranded runners — for a total of nine for the Bulls.
Fenerbahce on Thursday earned a rare 2-1 win in England, but were still knocked out of the UEFA Europa League by Nottingham Forest in the playoffs. Forest entered the second leg with a healthy 3-0 lead from the opener in Istanbul — where Vitor Pereira made an impact in his first game in charge — and that proved enough to advance to the round-of-16 with a 4-2 aggregate score. The result was a boost for Forest, struggling at 17th place in the Premier League, in their return to Europe after three decades. They next face Real Betis Balompie or Kerem Akturkoglu gave Fenerbahce
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