Cuba Wins Pitching Duel 3-0 over DR
By Circles Robinson
HAVANA TIMES, Oct. 4 — Hitless for 5.2 innings, Cuba erupted for three runs in the sixth to defeat the Dominican Republic for their second shutout win of the 2011 IBAF World Cup being played in Panama.
A two-out single by Frederich Cepeda off thus far vacuum tight Willi Lebron started things off. A costly fielding error by shortstop H. Mateo on a groundball by Alfredo Despaigne then put two runners on.
Yulieski Gourriel followed by lining the ball to left to drive in Cepeda, and in the wink of an eye Alexei Bell doubled to bring in Despaigne and Gourriel closing out the scoring.
Miguel Alfredo Gonzalez pitched seven innings of three hit baseball, all singles, allowed one walk and struck out five to get the win. Yadier Pedroso came on to pitch the final two hitless innings, striking out four of the seven batters he faced.
Lebron was the hard luck loser, as all of Cuba’s runs were unearned.
Cuba plays Venezuela on Tuesday night at (8:30 p.m. local time) in a match-up of the two undefeated teams atop Group 2 of the tournament.
World Cup 2011 Standings
Group 1
Netherlands, Canada and Panama (2-0), Puerto Rico (1-1), Japan, USA (0-1), Chinese Taipei, Greece (0-2)
Group 2
Cuba, Venezuela (2-0), Dominican Republic, Italy, Nicaragua, South Korea (1-1), Germany, Australia (0-2)
The top four teams from each group will qualify for the second round.