Yomiuri blanks Lotte to reach final of Asia Series

BUSAN (Yonhap) -- Japanese baseball champions Yomiuri Giants blanked South Korea's Lotte Giants 5-0 on Saturday to reach the final of the Asia Series tournament.

At Sajik Stadium in this southeastern city, starter Hirokazu Sawamura threw seven scoreless innings and struck out six for the Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB) champs in the Group B contest. Yomiuri will face the Lamigo Monkeys of Taiwan in the final at 2 p.m. Sunday.

The Monkeys, the reigning Taiwanese league champions, have defeated the China Stars of China and the South Korean champs Samsung Lions in Group A play to make their first Asia Series final.

This year's Asia Series, hosted by South Korea for the first time, brought together six clubs from South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, China and Australia.

The teams were divided into two groups of three, and the top clubs of the two groups are meeting in the final after two intra-group matches apiece.

In Group A, the Lions failed to become the first team to win back-to-back Asia Series titles, losing to the Monkeys 3-0 Friday. The Lions are scheduled to face the Stars in an inconsequential game at 6 p.m. Saturday. The Stars lost their first game to the Monkeys 14-1 on Thursday.

The Perth Heat, the Australian champs, were knocked out of Group B with two losses. They fell to Lotte 7-1 Thursday and to Yomiuri 6-1 Friday.

Samsung, Yomiuri, Perth and Lamigo are here as champions of their respective leagues. The Stars are an All-Star team and the Lotte Giants are based in the host city of Busan.

For Yomiuri on Saturday, Shuichi Murata lined a two-out single to drive in the first run for Yomiuri in the top of the first.

The visiting Giants went up 2-0 in the third, as Kenji Yano's double play with no out and bases loaded brought Hayato Sakamoto home from third.

Yomiuri made it 3-0 in the fourth on another grounder, this time by Tetsuya Matsumoto to second with runners on the corners.

The lead became 4-0 in the sixth, when Lotte's first baseman Park Jong-yoon bobbled a grounder to let in a runner from third.

Matsumoto made it a five-run game with a bloop single to right in the top ninth.

While Yomiuri chopped its way to the win, Lotte failed to get on board despite putting runners in scoring position in the first, second, third and fifth innings. The South Korean Giants also couldn't capitalize on Sawamura's six walks.

The right-handed Sawamura scattered four hits for the win. Lotte threw six pitchers at Yomiuri, and starter Ko Won-jun took the loss, giving up three runs on seven hits in four innings.

Tatsunori Hara, Yomiuri's manager, said he felt this would be the team's most important match of the Asia Series.

"I felt Lotte would be our toughest opponent in the group stage, and we started our best pitcher today," Hara said. "Sawamura lived up to our expectations. We scored first and remained in control the rest of the game."

Hara said his players took this match as seriously as they take their NPB regular season games, and it will be no different in the final on Sunday.

"The final will be our team's final game of 2012," the manager said. "We will have everyone play hard to the last out."

Kwon Doo-jo, Lotte's bench coach serving as interim manager this week, admitted it was a complete loss for his side.

"We lost the battle of starting pitching," Kwon said. "I don't have any more to say."

NPB teams have won four of the past five Asia Series.

The Asia Series began in 2005, pitting champions from South Korea, Japan and Taiwan, and either an All-Star team or the league champion from China against each other. Konami, a Japanese game company, sponsored the tournament from 2005 to 2008, but pulled out after 2008, citing declining interest in the event.

In 2009, the KBO and the NPB held a single club championship match in Japan and the KBO, NPB and Taiwan's Chinese Professional Baseball League champions met in Taiwan the following year. These events were not called the Asia Series.