PHOENIX-It was not the start that Canada was looking for in their first game of the World Baseball Classic as Italy banged-out seventeen hits and handed Canada a 14-4 mercy-rule loss to improve their record to 2-0 in the tournament, and also 2-0 against Canada all-time at the WBC.
Canada trailed Italy 6-1 after five innings before closing the gap to 6-4 after scoring a run in the top of the sixth and two more in the top of the seventh. Italy scored three runs in the bottom of the seventh and added another five in the eighth which ended the game via the mercy rule.
“We just got beat,” said Canadian Manager Ernie Whitt. “They came up with some key hits that really kind of hurt.
“We got within two runs, and we weren't able to shut them down. So sometimes you have to give the opponent some credit too.”
Italy opened the scoring in the home half of the first when Nick Punto hit a leadoff single, advanced to second on a wild-pitch before moving to third on a groundout and scored on an Anthony Rizzo groundout.
Canada tied the game in the second when Michael Saunders (Victoria, BC) doubled and later scored when Pete Orr (Newmarket, ON) doubled to the wall in right field.
Italy jumped out to a 5-1 lead in the third when they scored four times with the big blow coming in the form of a three-run homer off the bat of Chris Colabello.
Colabello was the offensive star for Italy going 4-for-5 with four RBI to go along with three runs scored.
The homer came off reliever Scott Mathieson (Aldergrove, BC) who replaced Canadian starter Shawn Hill (Georgetown, ON) with two out and a runner on third in the inning.
With the score now 6-1, Canada began chipping away at the lead in the sixth when Justin Morneau (New Westminster, BC) scored on a groundout from third from Adam Loewen (Surrey, BC).
It looked as though Canada was mounting a comeback in the seventh when Michael Saunders singled with the bases loaded to score Cale Iorg (Toronto, ON) and Joey Votto (Etobicoke, ON), but Italy responded with three runs, all coming with two out, in the seventh to go in front by five.
Italy scored five runs in the eighth on the strength of six hits six-hits which effectively ended the contest.
Canada will now face a must-win game against Mexico tomorrow if they have any hope of finishing in the top two spots in Pool D and advancing to the second round of the tournament.
“We'll show up and we'll play (tomorrow), that's all can I say,” added Whitt. We have to pitch better, we have to get some more timely hits and go from there.”
Canada will start Chris Leroux (Mississauga, ON) tomorrow against Mexico with the first pitch coming at 12:38pm MT/2:38pm ET.
The game can be watched live in Canada on Sportsnet and in the United States on MLB Network
