UK REIGNS SUPREME
Champs from left Kevin Leach(Ireland),Rob Irvine(England),Nick Wadden(England),Joe Callahan(Ireland) and Rob (Scotland)
The 2nd annual Burby World Cup went down Saturday from Diplomatico Field in the heart of Little Italy. The defending champion UK team, last year's runner up Eastern Block along with the Mediterranean and Can-Am all took to the concrete for a sudden death tourney.
Our first matchup at 12pm saw the hometown hero Mediterranean squad take on the Eastern Block. Pitching ruled the day as Joel Heard, Rob Skasko, Gino Collura and Marcus Belardi were in fine form. This game actually didn't even have a tally until the last inning when Gino sent the fans into a frenzy with a walkoff triple. The Medi's move on to the final.
Next up we had the defending champs UK taking on Can-Am. UK was in tough against Steven Parsons but managed to scratch out 3 runs on a Rob Scotland rbi double, a Kevin Leach rbi single and a bases loaded walk by Nick Wadden. That was all they needed as Wadden tossed a couple scoreless then Callaghan carried it home, make the final 4-0 and a trip back to the finale.
The big game saw Collura and Wadden take the hill for their respective squads and once again, Wadden did his part in throwing 2 clean innings and setting up the UK's power 5 inning closer Leach. Still without a score though, the UK needed to get something going and Rob Irvine had a big triple, to go with timely hits from Leach and Wadden and suddenly the Mediterranean had a 4 run deficit and Leach on the hill. That was all she wrote and the UK wins back to back cups behind great pitching and some opportunistic hitting.
It was a fantastic day with competitive games and great weather, good times all around and Team UK is already preparing for it's 2017 title defense!
New Uniforms can't help Eastern Block. From Left Greg Majster(Poland),Rob Skakso(Poland),Joel Heard(Ukraine) Adrian Golombek (Czech)
