U-21 Baseball World Cup 2014

07/11/2014 - 16/11/2014

 

Hosted by:   TPE


Host Chinese Taipei aims to keep 21U Baseball World Cup trophy

Host Chinese Taipei aims to keep 21U Baseball World Cup trophy
05/11/2014

TAICHUNG, Taiwan – The Chinese Taipei 21U National Baseball Team has no plans for the inaugural world championship trophy of the 21U Baseball World Cup to leave the host nation.

By Richard Wang, IBAF Asia Correspondent

TAICHUNG, Taiwan – The Chinese Taipei 21U National Baseball Team has no plans for the inaugural world championship trophy of the 21U Baseball World Cup to leave the host nation.

The 11-nation 21U Baseball World Cup opens Friday and takes place over 43 contests, coming to a close on Sunday, November 16.

Chinese Taipei’s National Team will be led by first-time National Team leader Kuo-Lee Chien-Fu – a former Olympian (Seoul 1988 and Barcelona 1992) and also former member of Nippon Professional Baseball’s (NPB) Hanshin Tigers and Chinese Professional Baseball League’s (CPBL) Chinatrust Whales.

Chinese Taipei, whose National Team program is ranked 4th in the world, features young talent from professional and university levels, including players from CPBL’s EDA Rhinos, NPB’s Seibu Lions and Major League Baseball’s Chicago Cubs minor league club.

The World No. 4 will also have players on their 21U National Team who earned a silver medal for Chinese Taipei at the 2014 Asian Games that took place in Incheon, South Korea this past September.

The pitching staff of Chinese Taipei will be led by Chia-Hao Sung, who will start against Mexico in Friday’s opener. Sung is a current member of the National Sports University baseball club in Taiwan and was a member of Chinese Taipei’s National Team in Incheon.

Ming-Hsuan Chen, who also plays for Coach Kuo-Lee at Kainan University, will be scheduled to start Chinese Taipei on Day 2, which is versus the Czech Republic.

The Seibu Lions’ Chun-Lin Kuo will be the starting pitcher against South Korea on Day 3.

Jhih-Long Yang (Chinese Culture University) is scheduled to pitch against New Zealand on Day 4. Yang has been actively involved with international tournaments since high school and has been selected to represent the country in various tournaments since 2001.

Chinese Taipei is in Group A, along with No. 8 South Korea, No. 11 Italy, No. 13 Mexico, No. 25 New Zealand and No. 26 Czech Republic.

The top three teams from the preliminary Round Robin will advance to the Super Round Robin.

Added anticipation and excitement has been building for the start of the 21U Baseball World Cup because it is the final global competition before announcing the twelve qualified teams for “The Premier 12”, the new flagship, pro-player international baseball tournament that will be launched in 2015 and feature the world’s Top 12 ranked nations and award US$ multi-millions in prize money.

____

For more information on the 21U Baseball World Cup and real-time updates and coverage, please follow:

Copyright © IBAF 1999-2014. All rights reserved.