
Israel eliminated Mexico in the baseball knockout stage competition at the Tokyo 2020 as their first victory. Danny Valencia propelled his side with a loud three-run homer to turn out a six-run dominant at the Yokohama Baseball stadium. “I don’t think it’s so much about beating Mexico,” said Nick Rickles after the 12-5 victory.
“I think it’s a lot to just raise awareness for baseball in Israel. For me, I was last taking at the moment and seeing after the game the amount of love that we received from people back in Israel,” he added.
Israel will be back in action on Tuesday against the winner of Monday’s future between South Korea and the Dominican Republic with both at 1-1 and have the possibility to progress to the next round where they will have a clash against either the United States or the hosting country Japan on Wednesday. The winners will then advance to the gold medal fixture.
Israel succeeded its group at the 2017 World Baseball Classic and beat Cuba in the second round followed by their victory in a two-continent Olympic qualifying competition where they defeated the Netherlands for one of the six Olympics berths. It failed its opening fixture against South Korea to 6-5 in 10 innings.