Ramstein Little League manager Staff Sgt. Andre Murray said his team has lots of confidence, win or lose.
Brad Osborne’s grand slam on Thursday helped boost Ramstein over Brunssum, Netherlands, 15-7 in the European Regional Tournament’s Trans-Atlantic playoffs in Kutno, Poland.
Osborne’s center-field blast came in the top of the fourth inning and gave Ramstein an 8-5 lead it never gave up.
“Once our players read a pitcher and read him well, they can hit him — no problem — and just keep it going,” said Murry, whose team lost to Belgium 4-0 Wednesday. “Nine times out of 10 we use the momentum in the next game and continue from there.”
Also on Thursday, Saudi Arabia defeated England 15-1 and Rota, Spain, beat SHAPE/Waterloo, Belgium 8-6.
The eight teams play a round-robin and the teams with the four best records advance to the tournament semifinals Tuesday. The championship is Wednesday.
Saudi Arabia is undefeated at 3-0. Ramstein, Rota and Belgium are at 2-1. Austria was 1-1 going into Thursday’s late game against Naples (0-2).
Murray said his Ramstein team uses an Eminem lyric to pick itself up before each game: “If you had one shot, one opportunity to seize everything you ever wanted, one moment, would you capture it?”
“That’s what got us through districts and that’s what is getting us through this tournament,” Murray said.
Saudi Arabia, which has won the Trans-Atlantic playoffs 10 of the past 12 years.
“Defensively we had some problems today,” Belgium coach Sgt. Felix Chavez said. “We’re a very strong defensive team so it was very uncharacteristic.
“We were not backing up throws, not throwing to the right base. We were running when we should have been holding and holding when we should be running, missing signals — it just got out of hand.
“It will be a challenge for the coaches to get the boys refocused.”
