23/10/2018 2 Minute Read

Jose Rodriguez closes the door, Venezuela advances unbeaten to Super Round

In the last day of the Opening Round Venezuela clinched the first place in Group B with a 9-2 victory over Korea. THe South American team advances to Super Round unbeaten, while the Asians will also be present in the next round (their position will be decided by the next games).

In the bottom of the third episode Yonny Hernández put Venezuela ahead with an RBI single to right field. Yoel Romero walked and advanced to second with a sacrifice by Jorma Rodríguez. From there he scored with the single by Hernandez, who then stole second base and scored with Leandro Cedeño’s single.

In the bottom of the fifth a single of Anthony Concepción scored Jesus Lujano to put the game 3-0.

However, in the top of the sixth inning the heart of the Korean lineup made it a 1 run game. Donghui Han and Minhyeok Kim reached with consecutive singles, and then the fifth bat Sungju Moon connected a line through the center field that went to the fence, allowing the two runners to score easily. José Rodríguez entered to relieve Luis García, with one out on the board, and the righty struck out the two batters he faced with a nasty slider in the outside corner, to avoid further damage.

With the game 3-2, Venezuela continued scoring consistently in the next innings. In the bottom of the sixth Jesus Lujano plated Yoel and Jorma Romero. And in the seventh Venezuela secured the game with three runs. Joel Díaz, Carlos Machado and Yoel Romero hit consecutive singles, and Jorma Romero walked to produce one more. Hernandez produced one more with a hit and finally Venezuelan eighth run was scored on a wild pitch.

The last run of the match was driven by Georvic Perez with a sacrifice fly, to put the game 9-2.

The match was won by José Rodríguez in relay of 3.2 innings, in which he allowed 2 hits and struck out 7. For his part, the starter Nivaldo Rodríguez pitched for 4 innings, with 2 hits, 1 ticket and 6 Ks. The match was lost by Yoonchul Park (2.1 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 BB, 3 K).

With this result Venezuela secured the first place of the group and will travel to the Super Round undefeated. For its part, Korea also advances to the decisive stage. The Super Round will begin next Thursday in Barranquilla.