Our National Men’s Baseball Team – the Red Hawks – reached fourth place last week at the WBSC Europe Super6 Tournament in Hoofddorp, The Netherlands; where the top 6 European National Teams battled it out in Baseball and Softball.
The Red Hawks had reached sixth place in the E.C. of 2016 with a new and young team. They have made visible progress the past two years and have now proved that this was not a stroke of luck. Belgium has arrived in the top 4 of Europe! Of which the top three in recent years consists of power houses The Netherlands, Italy and Spain. These three have significantly larger budgets and keenly use overseas-players-with-passports from the Big Leagues in America.
In a well-organized Super6 Tournament, The Red Hawks lost their first game against Spain that had been going all out to get a win against Belgium. Belgium offered good resistance to a stronger Italy, but eventually lost 4-7. It became clear that the fourth place in the Super6 Tournament was to be battled out by three more or less equal teams; Belgium, Germany and the Czech Republic. The mutual result between these three was the same, which made it possible for the Belgians to make the difference against The Netherlands in their final game. However, due to the bad weather the last one-and-a-half-day of the tournament, this game was cancelled. The Netherlands became champion and Belgium reached a well-earned fourth place.
This Super6 result is a great starting point for next year’s E.C. and Olympic Qualifiers of 2019.
