Danes Head Into Final After Tiebreak Win Over Croatia

The first game of final day was a tight one. Croatia gave a great fight for the Final, but eventually lost in 8th inning.

The Croats went ahead with first offense, but Denmark quickly equalised after they were given base on balls three times and hit by pitch on top of that. Tobias Holmelund put his side in front with a solo home run in bottom of third, but Croatia replied. Njuhovič got a base on balls, moved up on third on catcher’s error and home thanks to Balent’s solid hit.

With the last two innings left runless, the game moved into a tiebreak, first of the tournament. Croatia started well, when Potocki stole third base on passed ball. Anyway, Denmark saved it with a double play, when Holmelund caught Balent´s attempt in center field and passed it to Brown to home plate just in time.

Croatia chose two intentional walks in bottom to keep Brown and Johansen away from bat. However, they made a crucial mistake with the bases loaded as Kukolja threw a wild pitch and Milne got himself home with a game-winning run.

Gilles Fournier said: “It was tighter than we expected it. Lucas [Lohmann – pitcher] had a good game. They didn’t have many hits and they only scored on BBs, sacrificial bunts or errors we made. On the other side, we didn’t score as much as we needed and we left lots of runners on base. We have to score six or seven runs in the Final and hold the Czechs on five.”

Croatian coach Damir Mandić was happy despite being defeated. “We may did some errors that cost us the game. We had to risk in the tiebreak to get the run we needed, because we have never been so close to Final. Our runner tried to get home from third on sacrificial bunt, but it just didn’t happen. It was a really great game,” he said.