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European and International baseball news

by Matt Smith

If you haven’t checked out Mister-Baseball.com today, they have published a number of interesting posts about the 2009 World Cup and baseball’s attempt to make it back into the Olympics. 

Italy’s ‘Promoters’ Committee’ for the World Cup contains four government officials, a figure very unlikely to be matched if Britain had been playing a major hosting role in the competition (John Prescott would be adept at providing some Yogi Berra style ‘unique’ sayings though).  The report also mentions the ongoing plans, backed by MLB, to build “the most modern baseball stadium in Europe” on a site in Rome.

Another ballpark is undergoing a makeover thanks to the World Cup.  The German city Regensburg (twinned with Aberdeen according to Wikipedia) will be home to a 10,000 capacity baseball stadium, a venue fit to welcome the United States, China and Venezuela for Group E.

One of the main stated reasons why the World Cup was moved from Cuba (the original hosts) to Europe was to capitalise on the International Olympic Committee event that will be staged in Denmark in the following month (October).  It is at this conference where the IOC will decide which two sports should be added to the 2016 Olympic programme and baseball is hoping that the World Cup will be an excellent showcase for the sport.  A six-man panel, including Detroit Tigers star Curtis Granderson, will be meeting the IOC Program Commission tomorrow to put baseball’s case forward.  Good luck guys.

And if that’s not enough, there is also a great collection of photos of ball fields from various countries, including a shot of the Bracknell Blazers’ home and a couple of photos (of fields in Ireland and Sweden) submitted by Josh Chetwynd.

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