#lovesoftball #rainnotsomuch
Teams of group A spent their first day at the Hippos arena field in Havlickuv Brod and group B in Kostelec nad Orlicí. Just like yesterday, most of the games were adjudicate by mercy rule and the weather complicated the second half of the day.
Teams of the European top 5, such as Denmark and the Netherlands, were supposed to face each other but due to bad weather conditions some of the games were postponed. The Czech Republic and Great Britain played their duel in late evening hours; the game took over two hours and was decided in the bottom of the seventh inning with two outs by a walk-off homerun by Matouš Kasal.
Round robin will be completed tomorrow. If all assumptions will have been met, tomorrow’s scenario may look like this:
Group B:
The Israeli are still unbeaten but tomorrow, they are going to face two of the strongest teams – the Netherlands and Denmark. However, Israel has a chance to proceed to the top 3 in the group if they beat Sweden (delayed game from today).
If the Netherlands and Denmark keep their (playing) standards their mutual game (10:00 in Kostelec) will determine the first and the second spots from which both will advance to the quarterfinal group. On the other hand Croatia has probably lost their chances and hopes for medals when they lost the first game of the tournament against Israel.
Slovakia and Sweden are going to fight for their first victory tomorrow; they will face each other at 14:45 in Kostelec.
Group A:
The Czech Republic and Great Britain will take the first and the second places (respectively) in their round-robin group. The third place belongs to Belgium at the moment but Italy can set back that. So that the last game of the group – Belgium vs Italy may adjudge about the third team. Let’s not forget about Germany who can still play their part in this situation and complicate one’s dream.
The tournament’s novice – Lithuania is dropping behind.
And what will happen then? The top three teams from both groups will play the quarterfinal group from where they can enter the page system. Bottom three will play the placement round.