Netherlands win U-23 Baseball European Championship 2023 in Wiener Neustadt

Gold Medal Game: Great Britain – Netherlands 5-23 (Box score)
The Gold Medal Game, which started with a one-hour delay due to the sun, started off rather unusually. Midway through the top of the fourth inning the Netherlands led 5-3 over Great Britain, as the Dutch team was still waiting for their first hit of the game and GB had one. However afterwards the floodgates opened, and the Netherlands decided the outcome with a 13-run rally in the fourth en route to a 23-5 win.

The Dutch team added even seven more runs in the fifth for a combined 20 runs between the fourth and fifth inning. The Netherlands needed just six hits overall in the game to score the 23 runs as British pitching conceded a whopping 19 base on balls in the game plus five errors on defense. Five Dutch players scored three runs apiece. Jair van Borkulo and Jeandro Tromp had three RBI each. Netherlands pitching issued just three runs (2 ER) on only one hit and four base on balls in five innings.

It is the third title for the Netherlands at U-23 Baseball European Championships, since Baseball Europe switched from U-21 to U-23 in 2017. It is also the second consecutive title for the Dutch team. For Great Britain silver is the first medal at U-23. They finished in fourth place in 2021.   

Bronze Medal Game: Germany – France 0-5 (Box score)
France captured the bronze medal at the U-23 Baseball European Championship with a 5-0 shutout over Germany in the game for third place on Saturday afternoon in Schwechat, Austria. Two runs apiece in the third and fifth and a fifth run in the seventh were all the French team needed. Nicolas Antoine issued just three hits and four walks in 5 2/3 innings to stifle the German offense. Nathan Laot closed out the shutout. Paolo Brossier homered and drove in two. Julien Monks also collected two RBI.

Relegation Round: Italy – Czechia 11-7 (Box score)
Italy won 11-7 in the relegation round on Saturday morning against Czechia. After seven innings the game was tied at 3-3. In the eighth inning with the extra inning tiebreaker rule Czechia scored four runs in the top of the seventh with Italy answering with eight. The final four runs came through a walk-off grand slam home run from Samuele Gamberini. Lorenzo Morresi also went deep for Italy.

Relegation Round: Austria – Belgium 6-2 (Box score)
In the relegation round game on Saturday afternoon Austria captured a 6-2 win over Belgium in a meeting of previously winless teams in the tournament. Both teams will get relegated and need to go through the U-23 Baseball European Championship Qualifiers next year. After Belgium took a quick 2-0 lead after four innings, Austria scored six runs in the sixth to turn things around.

Complete results and all statistics can be found at www.wbsceurope.org. Games can be watched on the WBSC Europe YouTube channel.

Photo by Bob Prins