US softball team uses short game to shut out China 9-0 at Beijing Olympic Games
18/8/2008 18:13
Three-time defending champion the US softball team beat host China in
Beijing today at the Beijing Olympic Games with a stunning 9-0.
American
batter's explosion in the opening inning resulted in China's fifth defeat of the
tournament, ending the host's last Olympic show in advance.
"We know that
this is our last competition at the Olympics, so we gave the performing chance
to all the 15 team members. We hope they could show their unity and spirits
here," said Wang Lihong, head coach of the Chinese softball team.
The
powerful swing of Kelly Kretschman's home run gave the US team a quick lead in
the bottom of the first inning, blasting the ball over the right field wall for
a 3-0 advantage.
China's ace pitcher Lu Wei just couldn't stop allowing the
opponent's unstoppable base hits, giving up six runs and was replaced by Yu
Huili before the inning ended.
But Yu still falied to suppress the hot
batting Americans, allowing three more runs and the US widened the lead to 9-0.
American's nine runs in a singe inning also tied the Olympic record which was
created by Chinese Taipei in 1996.
Chinese strong-minded girls settled down
after the open inning's nightmare and gradually solidified their defence amid
encouraging cheers of over 5,000 fanatic spectators under the scorching
sun.
Center fielder Zhou Yi succeeded to catch a potential homer with a
diving save in the second inning, showing the host's decision to go down
swinging at softball's last Olympic show.
Silenced through the third and
fourth, the US ended the game in five short innings under the "Run Ahead Rule",
which provides that a game will be declared complete and over after five innings
if one team leads the other by seven or more run.
The lopsided game was also
China's last show at the Olympic arena. With the win-loss record of 2-5, China
only finished sixth in the eight-team tournament and failed to advance to the
page system finals. The top four teams from the ongoing preliminaries will
contest for the medals.
"Chinese team played well in the last four inning and
didn't give us many chances," said Kelly Kretschman, who delivered the home
run.
But she said that the US team is always trying to play the best as they
could.
Looking into the competition with other strong teams like Japan, the
girl added, "there are always challenges."
Chinese softballers made the
history by grabbing a silver medal at the Atlanta Olympics in 1996, when the
sport was first introduced to the Olympic agenda. In the following Sydney and
Athens Games, they narrowly missed a podium finish.
If the hard-bitten girls
set their minds to fulfil medal dream and re-prove themselves, they have to wait
another eight years or more instead of four, as the sport was voted out of the
2012 London Games.
Xinhua
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