Taipei: Taiwan's national baseball team suffered a shutout 2-0 loss to Venezuela in the opening game of the WBSC Premier12 Super Round at the Tokyo Dome on Thursday. Competing under the name Chinese Taipei, Taiwan managed a total of 7 hits during the game, one more than Venezuela's 6. However, it was not enough to secure a win.According to Focus Taiwan, the turning point came when Venezuelan catcher Carlos Perez hit a two-run homer to deep left field in the bottom of the fourth inning, which delivered the only runs of the game. Taiwan's most promising opportunity arose in the top of the fifth inning with the bases loaded and only one out, but Venezuelan reliever Liarvis Breto struck out Chen Chen-wei, followed by Pedro Garcia inducing an infield flyball from Lin Li to end the inning.At a post-game news conference, Taiwan's manager Tseng Hao-ju expressed his disappointment at the inability to score despite having more hits. He commended the team's relievers for their performance in keeping the game competi tive and vowed to make adjustments for future matches, expressing confidence in his players.The game highlighted a notable difference in strikeouts, with 13 Taiwanese batters struck out by eight Venezuelan pitchers, compared to five Venezuelan batters struck out by five Taiwanese pitchers. The game also featured a pitchers' duel between Taiwan's Huang Tzu-peng of the Rakuten Monkeys and Venezuela's Nivaldo Rodriguez of the Fubon Guardians, both of whom are from Taiwan's Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL). Huang allowed two earned runs on five hits with three strikeouts in 4.2 innings, while Rodriguez pitched four scoreless innings, striking out five and allowing only three hits.Taiwan is set to face Team USA on Friday at the Tokyo Dome. Both Taiwan and Venezuela are among the four teams that advanced to the Super Round. Taiwan entered this stage with a 4-1 record from Group B, having defeated South Korea, Dominican Republic, Australia, and Cuba, but lost to Japan. Venezuela, who topped Group A, a lso advanced with a 4-1 record, securing wins against Mexico, USA, Puerto Rico, and the Netherlands, while only losing to Panama.The tournament structure dictates that the top two teams in the Super Round will compete for the gold medal, while the third and fourth place teams will vie for bronze. The 2024 WBSC Premier12 is the third edition of the championship, organized by the World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC), featuring the world's top 12 national teams. Taiwan previously finished ninth in 2015 and reached the Super Round in 2019, finishing fifth.