2020: Women's Baseball World Cup - Four teams to make dream debut
The hosts Mexico, China, France and the Philippines will participate for the first time. The ninth edition of the event will be a 12-team tournament.
Four countries - Mexico, China, France and the Philippines - will make their debut when the ninth edition of the WBSC Women's Baseball World Cup takes place in Monterrey, Mexico in October, 2020. They join six-time champions Japan, and Canada, USA, Chinese Taipei, Australia, Venezuela, Cuba and the Netherlands in the biennial tournament, which, for the third successive edition, will feature 12 teams. All four countries are unranked.
France was the first National Team to qualify for the premier event in women's international baseball after defeating the Netherlands in the inaugural Women's Baseball European Championship on home turf in Rouen in August.
Victory selfie ! Bravo à l’Equipe de France Féminine de Baseball, première Championne d’Europe de l’histoire et qualifiée pour la Coupe du Monde de Baseball Féminin 2020 🙌 pic.twitter.com/DWaRRKJVPS
France recently named Lahcène Benhamida as its Women's National Team manager.
World No. 11 the Netherlands will participate in the World Cup thanks to a wild card issued by the WBSC Executive Board. This will mark the first time two European National Teams compete in the tournament.
Mexico qualified in late August, as they finished fourth in the first-ever Women's Pan-Am Baseball Championship. Mexico lost three games but had the two best pitchers: Rosa Maria del Castillo (two wins, no earned run allowed) and Flor Elena Valerio (2.25 ERA).
World No. 4 USA won the tournament undefeated thanks to a dominating offence, led by Alex Rizzo. World No. 5 Venezuela finished second and world No. 2 Canada finished third in the Confederation of Panamerican Baseball (COPABE) event. Cuba will be the fifth representative from the Americas in the Women's World Cup 2020 after receiving the second wild card from the WBSC Executive Board.
USA 🇺🇸 2019 Pan Am #WomensBaseball Champions🏆!!! 1st USA 🇺🇸🏆 *** 2nd VEN 🇻🇪🥈*** 3rd CAN 🇨🇦🥉 *** 4th MEX 🇲🇽 *** 5th CUB 🇨🇺 6th DOM 🇩🇴 7th NCA 🇳🇮 8th PUR 🇵🇷
The Philippines defeated hosts China to finish third at the Women's Baseball Asian Cup in November in Zhongshan. Four National Teams qualified through the Baseball Federation of Asia (BFA) event with world No. 1 Japan winning the tournament without losing a game while world No. 3 Chinese Taipei finished as the runner-up.
Japan has dominated the Women's Baseball World Cup since the third edition in 2008 and has now won six editions in a row.
The United States won the first two editions in 2004 and 2006, with Japan finishing as the runner-up.
The other silver medals went to Canada (2008, 2016), Australia (2010), USA (2012, 2014) and Chinese Taipei (2018). Canada also earned four bronze medals (2004, 2006, 2012 2018). The other third place finishers were USA (2008, 2010), Australia (2014) and Venezuela (2016).
The Women's World Cup grew from a five-team (USA, Japan, Canada, Australia and Chinese Taipei) tournament in the inaugural edition in August 2004 in Edmonton, Canada, to seven teams in 2006 in Taipei (Cuba and Hong Kong made their debut), to eight teams in 2008 in Matsuyama, Japan (the newcomer was India), to 11 teams in 2010 in Maracay, Venezuela (the host nation, Puerto Rico and Korea made their debut).
The number of participants fell back to eight in 2012 in Edmonton, but added two debutants: Australia and the Netherlands before the Women's World Cup reached the 12-team format in 2016 in Gijang, South Korea. Pakistan made its debut during that edition. The Dominican Republic was the only team of the 2018 edition making its debut appearance.
