Mexico emerge as baseball tournament champions in

The first Ashbourne International Baseball Festival week is regarded as being a tremendous success. The new International Baseball Centre located behind the Ashbourne Community Centre played host to visiting teams from Mexico, US, Belgium, Venezuela, and the Netherlands who last week competed against both the senior and cadet level Irish National Baseball Teams.

Earlier in the week, there was also a youth baseball camp. This was very well attended with over 50 kids in attendance each day from ages of five upwards. Members of the senior national team provided the coaching. While the weather did not cooperate on Wednesday morning and, unfortunately, that session had to be cancelled, the Monday and Tuesday sessions were held in glorious sunshine.

Wednesday afternoon had Venezuela face Mexico and the Venezuelan’s proved too strong for the Mexicans who were saving their best pitching for the tournament proper. The Irish team also bested the Mexicans in the evening exhibition game.

Thursday was the opening day of the tournament and began with Ireland’s cadet team (under 16s) facing the Netherlands team, who jumped out to an early lead. The Irish fought back bravely later in the game but ultimately couldn’t catch the Dutch and ended up with a 14-10 loss. Ashbourne was honoured to play host to both the Mexican Ambassdor, Carlos Garc’a de Alba and US Ambassdor, Kevin O’Malley, for the afternoon. A civic reception was hosted at the field by Meath County Council and then the Ambassadors jointly threw in the ceremonial first pitch to open the tournament, before staying on to watch the riveting opening game of the tournament between US and Mexico. This was a hard fought slug-fest that ended in a 13-13 draw. Ireland then faced Belgium in the evening game and came away with a comprehensive victory 14-0, pitched by Ireland’s Daniel Woodburne who ended up as the tournament’s Move Valuable Player.

Friday saw the cadets in action again in the morning and, having had a bit of a scare the day before, the Dutch were careful to put out their best line-up. The Irish bats were more subdued this time and the Dutch shut us out to emerge as victors 14-0. The US team took on the Belgians in the senior tournament in the afternoon game and were always in control, ending up winning by a score of 22-6. The evening game saw the Irish in action against the Mexican team, who had saved their best pitcher to face us. An ex-professional pitcher from the Chicago Cubs organisation, Rene Pablos managed to keep the Irish to a score of 5 runs in the game. It took a few innings for the Irish pitching to settle down and the Mexicans jumped out to an early lead which we weren’t able to reign in before the light started to fade, cutting the game short for a 7-5 loss to Ireland.

On Saturday, the Belgians took on the Mexican team in their final group stage game. The early start didn’t seem to suit the Mexicans and their bats were silent for the first five innings. The Belgians were leading by a score of 14-0 at that point. But boy did the Mexican bats wake up in the sixth inning where they batted around their order three times, putting up 17 runs! And they ultimately won this epic game by a score of 23-17.

Ireland then faced the US in the afternoon game in front of quite a crowd of supporters. The Irish bats were hot and quickly cut through three of the US pitchers before they went to their ace, an ex-college US pitcher. But the Irish were still able for him and managed to put up a total of 18 runs in the game. Nat Anglin was brought in to pitch for the Irish in the fourth inning and managed to keep the US bats under control for a final win to the Irish with a scoreline of 18-8.

That put the standings after the group games as Mexico, Ireland, USA, Belgium. Ireland and Mexico were through to the final. But, once again, the weather conspired against us and the Sunday playoff games had to be cancelled. So, based on the group standings, Mexico came away as the tournament champions with the Irish as the runners up.

But, overall, a hugely successful launch week for the new International Baseball Centre, and a big thanks was extended to all those who came out to support the boys in green. Next games at the IBC will be National League games with the Ashbourne Giants playing host to the Belfast Hornets for a double-header on Saturday 29th August, with the first pitch of game one starting at 10am.

 

Report: Sean Mitchell

Photos: Simon Jeacle.