Powered by Liu Fu-hao’s grand slam on a five-RBI night, the Uni-President Lions roughed up the EDA Rhinos 11-2 at the Tainan Municipal Baseball Stadium yesterday to even the weekend home stand at one win apiece.
The speedy outfielder made his anticipated return from injury, giving his club an 11-1 lead in the bottom of the fourth. His team went on to bag the victory and snap a three-game losing skid.
Kao Guo-ching’s two-out double off Rhinos starter Andy Sisco scored the runner all the way from first in the bottom of the first to give his team a 1-0 lead.
Photo: Huang Chih-yuan, Taipei Times
The lead would last just an inning as the Rhinos quickly answered with a run of their own when Chen Kai-lung led off the third inning with a single off Lions starter Chiang Cheng-yen, took second on a sacrifice bunt and scored on Hu Chin-lung’s RBI single.
That set up what turned out to be a six-run third for the Cats, who sent 10 men to the plate to ring up four singles and a pair of doubles off a struggling Sisco to put the game away long before the final out.
Picking up the win was Chiang, who remains unbeaten at 3-0 with two allowed runs on five hits over seven innings, while Sisco was charged with his second loss of the season, allowing seven runs on as many hits over three frames.
BROTHERS 5, MONKEYS 3
Chen Tzu-hao’s sly RBI-triple on a bluffed bunt attempt broke a three-all tie in the top of the seventh as the Chinatrust Brothers defeated the top-ranked Lamigo Monkeys at the Taoyuan International Baseball Stadium to even their weekend set.
It was by far the biggest hit of the season for the second-year slugger, who executed one of baseball’s toughest plays to perfection by drawing in the Lamigo infield with a sacrifice bunt before pulling back to connect on a liner to the right-center gap for a clean triple.
Even though the win stopped a two-game losing skid for the men in gold, the Monkeys still clinched the first-half title, with the second-placed EDA Rhinos’ loss dropping them out of title contention.
The Monkeys and Brothers traded three early runs over the first two innings of play before turning the contest into a defensive struggle, as neither club managed to score again until the top of the seventh.
Chinatrust starter Cheng Kai-wen also saw his personal-best shutout streak end at 18 innings by allowing the three first-inning runs (only one earned) to the Primates. He escaped the loss, as the Brothers offense bailed him out with the bat to keep his season record at 8-3.
Reliever Chiou Ping-rei was credited with his first win of the season for his two innings of scoreless relief, while the loss was charged to Monkeys starter Tseng Meng-cheng.
Yu Yao-hsing on Tuesday nabbed Taiwan’s only goal in the final round of qualifiers for the 2027 AFC Asian Cup, as they fell 3-1 to Sri Lanka at Taipei Municipal Stadium. Early goals from Sri Lanka in the first half left Taiwan struggling to get on the board, and Christopher Tiao’s own goal at 53 minutes sealed the team’s fate in the third round of qualifiers. While acknowledging that the defeat, Taiwan’s sixth in Group D, was disappointing, head coach Matt Ross said he saw reasons to stay positive about the team’s development. “There were lots of positive signs in terms of the
INDIGESTION: Italy failed to qualify for the World Cup for a third consecutive time after a 4-1 defeat to Bosnia on penalties in a loss Gattuso said was ‘difficult to digest’ Coach Graham Arnold on Tuesday challenged his players to “shock the world” after Iraq became the 48th and final team to qualify for the FIFA World Cup with a nerve-shredding 2-1 win over Bolivia in an intercontinental playoff in Mexico, as Bosnia and Herzegovina, Turkey, the Czech Republic, Sweden and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) also secured their places at the finals. Iraq, whose preparations were disrupted by the war in the Middle East, sealed their first appearance at the finals in 40 years and are to play in Group I against France, Senegal and Norway. Goals from Ali al-Hamadi
Teng Kai-wei, the only Taiwanese player on an opening-day roster in this year’s Major League Baseball (MLB) season, took his first win of the year with the Houston Astros in his season debut. Teng entered in relief in the top of the fifth inning against the Los Angeles Angels on Saturday, with the Astros trailing 5-0. He pitched 2-1/3 scoreless innings with two strikeouts, as Houston scored 11 runs during his outing to snatch an 11-9 comeback victory. The win is the Astros’ first of the season and the third of Teng’s MLB career. “It’s my first time pitching for the Astros, so
Top seeded Jessica Pegula on Friday once again fought back from a set down to reach the WTA Charleston Open semi-finals with a 3-6, 6-3, 6-2 win against Russia’s Diana Shnaider. Defending champion Pegula has lost the first set in all three of her matches at the tournament so far, but again dug deep to maintain her hopes of retaining the title. The world No. 5 from the US took 2 hours, 10 minutes to defeat 19th-ranked Shnaider, relying on a formidable service game that included eight aces. Shnaider battled well in the first two sets and broke early for a 2-0 lead
RSS