Liu Fu-hao’s tiebreaking double off Huang Chin-chih in the bottom of the eighth inning scored the go-ahead run for the Uni-President Lions as they held on to top the Lamigo Monkeys 3-2 at the Tainan Municipal Baseball Stadium last night to win Game 4 of the Taiwan Series.
It was the third straight one-run win that the Lions have picked up over their archrivals from Taoyuan, giving them a 3-1 lead in the best-of-seven annual “Fall Classic,” one win away from clinching the coveted league title.
Tsai Jien-wei’s leadoff homer off -Lions starter Chen Yi-cheng put the on-the-road Monkeys ahead 1-0 in the top of the first only to see the home Lions return the favor with Chen Yung-chi’s equalizer, a towering shot to strait-away center field off Monkeys starter Shane Youman to tie the game at1-1.
The opportunistic Monkeys grabbed their second lead of the game at 2-1 when the Lions third baseman Chang “OEO” Tai-shan mishandled a line drive hit right at him by Huang Hao-ran.
What could have been an inning-ending double-play ended up giving the Monkeys an extra out, which led to ChenYen-fong’s RBI groundout in the top of the fourth.
The score remained at 2-1 until Kao Chih-kang tripled off Youman and scored on a passed ball against Monkeys catcher Chen Yen-fong in the sixth to tie the game at 2-2, setting the stage for Liu’s late-game heroics.
Lions reliever Wang Jing-ming was credited with the win for striking out the side in a perfect eighth, before Lin Yueh-ping retired the final three Monkeys batters to record the save.
It was Wang’s second win of the series following his Game 2 victory on Sunday.
Taking the loss was Huang, who pitched the Monkeys out of a jam in the seventh, but failed to do the same in the eighth in a losing effort.
Bayer 04 Leverkusen go into today’s match at TSG 1899 Hoffenheim stung from their first league defeat in 16 months. Leverkusen were beaten 3-2 at home by RB Leipzig before the international break, the first loss since May last year for the reigning league and cup champions. While any defeat, particularly against a likely title rival, would have disappointed coach Xabi Alonso, the way in which it happened would be most concerning. Just as they did in the Supercup against VfB Stuttgart and in the league opener to Borussia Moenchengladbach, Leverkusen scored first, but were pegged back. However, while Leverkusen rallied late to
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