The third round of Champions Cup didn’t bring any Czech wins
The first half of European Champions Cup was wrapped up with two games. After this round, there are no more unbeaten teams. Furthermore, Eagles are still waiting for their first win.
Eagles Praha team played at home for the first time when they hosted German Guggenberg Legionäre. Prague started with Natsuki Tamba on the mound, however, they pulled him down after two innings, without him allowing any hits. It was thus clear the coaches wanted to keep their pitchers fresh for Extraliga and none of their pitchers threw more than 2 innings.
We had to wait to see the first runs until the 4th inning, when Terrell Joyce refreshed Czech fans memories with a two run homerun. And this was all from each team for a while. The score changed in the ninth inning, and once again it was thanks to German side. Matyáš Trčka had 4 strikeouts in the inning, but also one walk and 3 hits. When we add up the defensive errors, it all ended in 4 more runs.
Eagles batters also didn’t have a good game, when they only had 2 hits, but 15 SO. Prague ended up scoreless and lost 0-6. This was the third loss for the team out of 3 games and advancement to the finals is now only theoretical.
Draci lost their first game
Brno played abroad for the first time, when they faced Heidenheim. And fans got to see a great pitching duel in Germany, between Filip Čapka and Drew Janssen. Both starters pitched well, especially Janssen, who only allowed 1 hit to Draci and struck out 9. Čapka threw 6 innings and he only allowed 1 run in the first inning.
Things went south for Czech champions in the bottom of the seventh inning. Tomáš Urbánek stepped on the mound and he didn’t have a bad start, when he and his defense played 2 quick outs. However, he was unable to get out of the inning and Germans kept piling up the hits. Thanks to two homeruns Heidenheim scored 6 runs with 2 outs.
Draci scored again in the eighth inning, when Mike Bolsenbroek came in for Janssen and Martin Červinka blasted a two run homerun. But this was all in the offense from Brno and the game finished 2-7. This was the first loss for Draci in Champions Cup, and they are currently tied with both German team, with record 2-1.
Champions Cup will now take a break for a month with the next round being played on 17th of July. Eagles will host Heidenheim and Draci travel to Regensburg.
