Ireland have won a deserved bronze medal at the 2019 Co-ed Slowptich Championships.

Following on from the disappointment of missing out on the final after defeats to the Netherlands and Czech Republic on Friday, Ireland got a chance for revenge as they took on the Czech Republic in the bronze medal final.

Ireland took an early lead in the game and unlike Friday, never let the Czech Republic back into the game with great defence and more importantly kept the score-board ticking over every inning. Truth be told, Ireland always looked like they could match Czech Republic on the scoreboard and bar a couple of hairy moments controlled the game, winning every inning on the scoreboard bar one. Ireland eventually won out 17-13 to bring home a bronze medal.

Speaking on the medal, Softball Ireland President Colum Lavery said “On behalf of all the members of Softball Ireland, I wish to congratulate Senan, the Players and Coaching staff on thier bronze medal. We all followed the ups and downs as the week went along and we are immensely proud of the way the team regrouped on Friday night to come out on Saturday to give such a dominant display. We are very proud of how they performed and we could not ask for any better representatives of our Country”

Softball Ireland would like to congratulate Steve Patterson, Kegs player and former Irish Fastpitch team national assistant coach, on his gold medal as head coach of Great Britain!

Next up for Ireland is the World Series in September.

IRELAND............. 164 123 0 - 17
CZECH REPUBLIC...... 142 033 0 - 13

Ireland to play for bronze medal on final day

Ireland will play for a bronze medal on the final day of the European Championships in Budapest  Hungary. 

Coming into the day, Ireland knew two wins would guarantee them a place in the final, whilst one win and a result going the right way would have also put them into the final. 

Ireland played the sleeping giant of the tournament, the Netherlands in the morning, the Netherlands record of 1 & 4 in the medal round doesn’t tell the true story of the quality in the team and Ireland went toe to toe with this European heavy weight. Once more the game was time limited to 6 innings, and after a back and forth game, a 5 run fifth inning just pushed the Netherlands noses in front enough to give them a 10-9 win. The box score for the game is below.

NETHERLANDS......... 300 250  - 10
IRELAND............. 303 201  -  9

The afternoon game saw Ireland play the Czech Republic. A win for Ireland coupled with a loss by Germany to Great Britain and Ireland were in the final. Ireland jumped into an early lead in the game leading into the fourth inning, however the Czechs put the pressure on by keeping the score board ticking over in most innings. Ireland would have felt comfortable chasing the Czech Republics 3 run lead going into the seventh, however, the Czech bats came alive and scored 8 runs in top of the seventh to leave Ireland chasing 10 runs. Ireland started eating away into the lead but unfortunately ran out of outs.

CZECH REPUBLIC...... 011 3408  - 19
IRELAND............. 050 4003  - 12

Following the two defeats, Ireland finish the round robin stage of the medal round on a 2 & 3 record meaning Ireland will play for the Bronze Medal tomorrow afternoon (2pm Irish Time) most likely against the Czech Republic.

The team will no doubt be disappointed not to reach the final, but all of us here in Ireland are very proud of how the team has competed and represented Ireland over the last number of days.

With a bronze medal to be played for we look forward to Ireland producing one more performance to take the medal home tomorrow!

The Bronze Medal game will take place at 1400 Irish Time tomorrow.

Eire Abu!

Ireland Top Group B Unbeaten

Day 2 Dominated

Updated: 19:45 July 17, 2019

Ireland started Day 2 of the European Championships unbeaten and top of the table and that is how the finished after setting their stall out and dominating both Bulgaria and Italy.

In the first game of the day, after a slow start against Bulgaria, Ireland took control half way through and never looked back finishing strong by scoring 12 runs in the bottom of 6 to beat a good Bulgaria team 20-4 (runs ahead rule).

Ireland then faced Italy in the afternoon game. Ireland dominated the game from start to finish and saw off Italy 20-12 to finish top of Group B with four wins as the first round of the tournament comes to a close. This was the first win of any Irish national softball team over European powerhouse Italy.

Ireland finish the first round unbeaten and above defending champions Germany.

Moving Forward

Ireland now progress to the next round of the tournament and as B1, Ireland will play Great Britain, the winner of Group A tomorrow at 17:45 Irish Time. The benefit of going unbeaten through the first round is that Ireland bring forward a 2 win and 0 loss record by virtue of beating Germany and Belgium as we take on the top 3 teams from Group A.

At the end of the next round robin phase, the final will be contested by the top two teams and bronze by the teams ranked 3 and 4.

A phenomenal start to the tournament and Ireland now carry some real momentum into the medal round.

Softball Ireland hope to stream tomorrow’s evening’s game on our Facebook page and all the results and schedules may be found by clicking here.

The schedule for the next phase of games is outlined below – Ireland are B1 in Group C.