ASIAN GAMES/Taiwan beats China 9-1 in Asian Games baseball super round

Taipei, Sept. 25 (CNA) Taiwan defeated China 9-1 in the baseball super round at the Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games on Friday, keeping its hopes of reaching the gold medal game alive, ahead of a game against host Japan.

Taiwanese starter Wang Yan-cheng (王彥程) worked seven innings, allowing one run on eight hits while striking out four and walking two. The left-hander escaped a scoring threat in the first inning and limited China to one run when its batters threatened again in the sixth.

Taiwan scored twice in the first inning and added a run in the fourth to lead 3-0. China scored its only run in the sixth, before Taiwan pulled away with four runs in the eighth and two more in the ninth.

Huang Wei-sheng (黃韋盛), Chen Min-shih (陳敏賜) and Kao Yu-wei (高育瑋) each drove in two runs for Taiwan, which collected 13 hits.

Japan, meanwhile, beat South Korea 5-0 in Friday's other super round game, improving its record in the four-team stage to 2-0.

Taiwan and South Korea are both 1-1, while China is 0-2.

Under the super round format, the top two teams from each preliminary group advance, carrying over only their result against the other qualifier from the same group.

They then play the two qualifiers from the opposite group, with the top two teams in the final standings advancing to the gold medal game.

Taiwan entered the super round with a loss because South Korea beat it 5-0 in their preliminary group matchup on Monday. Its wins over Thailand and Hong Kong did not carry over because neither team advanced.

Taiwan will face Japan at 6:30 p.m. local time Saturday in its final super round game.