The Uni-President Lions continued their recent surge with a 13-4 win over the Lamigo Monkeys at the Tainan Municipal Baseball Stadium last night that extended their lead in the standings over the Primates to 1.5 games.
The showdown between the top two clubs in the league did not live up to its billing, as the home side dominated from the start, with a four-run second inning against Monkey starter Mike Loree on the strength of four singles and a pair of walks, while batting around the order.
The Primates got one run back in the top of the third when Huang Hao-ran led off the inning with a single off Lion starter Pan “Du Du” Wei-lung. They then scored two batters later on Kuo Yen-wen’s sacrifice fly, but the Lions piled on five runs over the next two innings that knocked off Loree in the third and Hsieh Chang-long in the fourth.
Kuo’s three-run blast at the top of the fifth off Du Du cut the deficit to five, but the Cats plated three runs of their own an inning later.
By the time the dust from all the Lions’ ball-smashing and base path-thrashing had settled, they had racked up 21 hits to claim their fourth straight win.
Picking up the win for the Lions was Du Du, who improved to 6-9 for the season with four allowed runs on eight hits in five innings. The loss was charged to Loree, who was relieved after 2-1/3 innings of play.
RHINOS 8, ELEPHANTS 0
Lin Chen-hua became the league’s first 15 game-winner last night leading the EDA Rhinos past the Brother Elephants at the Cheng Ching Lake Baseball Stadium in Greater Kaohsiung.
The sophomore — who exceeded all expectations by winning 10 games in the first half before stumbling a slump that saw him drop three straight in July — was well on top of his game yesterday, holding the Elephants to six hits in as many scoreless innings.
That gave the Rhinos’ offense plenty of opportunity to tee off against an Elephant pitching side that served up 14 hits.
Tallon Griekspoor on Friday stunned top seed Alexander Zverev 4-6, 7-6 (7/5), 7-6 (7/4) in the second round at Indian Wells, avenging a devastating loss to the German at Roland Garros last year. Zverev, the world No. 2 who is heading the field of the prestigious ATP Masters event with No. 1 Jannik Sinner serving a three-month drugs ban, is the first Indian Wells men’s top seed to lose his opening match since Andy Murray in 2017. It was a cherished win for Griekspoor, who had lost five straight matches — including four last year — to the German. That included a five-setter
Five-time champion Novak Djokovic on Saturday tumbled out of the Indian Wells ATP Masters, falling in his first match to lucky loser Botic van de Zandschulp as two-time defending champion Carlos Alcaraz advanced. “No excuses for a poor performance,” 24-time Grand Slam champion Djokovic said after 37 unforced errors in a 6-2, 3-6, 6-1 defeat. “It doesn’t feel great when you play this way on the court,” he said. “But congratulations to my opponent — just a bad day in the office, I guess, for me.” Djokovic is just the latest in Van de Zandschulp’s string of superstar victims. He
Manchester United on Thursday settled for a 1-1 draw with Real Sociedad in the first leg of their Europa League round-of-16 tie. United led on Joshua Zirkzee’s goal in the 58th minute, but the hosts equalized 12 minutes later after Bruno Fernandes’ hand ball and Mikel Oyarzabal sent Andre Onana the wrong way from the penalty spot. The Europa League could be a way for United to finish the season with a trophy after crashing out of the FA Cup on Sunday. A spot in the quarter-finals is to be on the line at Old Trafford in the second leg on Thursday next
Paris Saint-Germain on Tuesday held their nerve to beat Liverpool 4-1 on penalties and reach the UEFA Champions League quarter-finals after their tie finished one-apiece on aggregate, while Bayern Munich saw off Bayer 04 Leverkusen to complete a 5-0 win over both legs. Lamine Yamal and Raphinha fired Barcelona into the next round as the Catalans bested SL Benfica 3-1, and Inter booked a last-eight meeting with Bayern by seeing off Feyenoord 2-1. At Anfield, Ousmane Dembele netted the only goal of the night as PSG bounced back from Liverpool’s late winner last week to force the tie to extra-time and penalties. Maligned
RSS