Taiwan on Wednesday maintained their dominance at the Little League Baseball World Series by advancing to the semi-finals with an easy win over Curacao, following two other victories earlier in the week.
Representing the Asia-Pacific region, Taiwan trounced the Caribbean representative Curacao 9-1 at Volunteer Stadium in Pennsylvania, in what was a rematch of a semi-final at the tournament last year.
It was Taiwan’s third straight win, after their perfect 6-0 game against Canada and a 10-0 no-hitter against Japan earlier in the week, with the latter game coming to an early end in four innings under the mercy rule.
Photo: AP
In the two earlier games, Taiwan, comprising players from Guishan Elementary School in Taoyuan, were boosted by the performance of pitcher Fan Chen-jun, who accumulated a 6.2 hitless innings, including an immaculate inning against Canada, and smashed Taiwan’s first homer at the World Series since 2015.
Team manager Lee Cheng-ta said he had discovered Fan two years ago and saw in the now-12-year-old more athletic ability than he “had ever seen” in a player, The Associated Press reported.
However, Fan could not pitch against Curacao due to pitch limit rules, but his absence gave the other Taiwan players an opportunity to showcase their strengths on the mound, with Cai Yuan-hao, Hsu Shao-chieh and Ye Quing-han racking up a combined seven strikeouts and three walks.
They yielded two hits, which came off starting pitcher Cai, including a solo shot sent to center field by Curacao’s Jay-Dlynn Wiel in the bottom of the first, which ended Taiwan’s 10-1/3-inning no-hitter streak at the tournament.
Offensively, Taiwan tallied six hits and eight walks, five of which were in the fifth inning when the players opened up the margin from 3-1 to 9-1.
With the win, Taiwan advanced to the semi-finals and will square off tomorrow at Lamade Stadium against the winner of yesterday’s game between Curacao and Mexico.
Taiwan also made it to the semi-finals last year and advanced in 2009 to the final of the competition, finishing in second place, but have not won the championship since 1996.
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