With the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games only four years away, the future of international women's softball is looking extremely bright and healthy, with some outstanding contests and great performances from amazing athletes on display this week at the WBSC Women's Softball World Cup Finals 2024 in Castions di Strada, Italy.
A total of 112 runs, including 10 homers, have been scored this week across 16 games at an average of seven per game. Plenty of offence with some thrilling action including three come-from-behind walkover wins, two extra innings thrillers and eight games won by three runs or less.
A lot of these stars of today, including USA's Megan Faraimo (pictured), made their first mark on the international scene at the WBSC U-18 Women's Softball World Cup - 41 players at the WBSC Women's Softball Cup Finals 2024 have played in the WBSC U-18 Women's Softball Cup - which will see its 15th edition start next week with Group A taking place in Sao Paulo, Brazil from 23-27 July.
The WBSC U-18 Women’s Softball World Cup held its first edition in Lima, Peru in 2021 but was previously staged 13 times as a U-19 or Junior event, where it has been the beginning of the Olympic career for many athletes, with Tokyo 2020 being a perfect example.
Of the 90 players who participated in the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games softball competition, 46 played in the Junior Women’s Softball World Championship in the early stages of their career, making the youth global tournament a starting point for the international career of the top players in the world. It includes players from all six participating nations in Tokyo.
Tokyo 2020 featured players from the previous eight junior World Cups over a span of 20 years, from 1999 to 2019. Veteran pitchers Yukiko Ueno (JPN) and Lauren Bay Regula (CAN) participated in the 1999 Junior Women’s World Championship in Taipei, with the Japanese legend pitching her team to the world title. While Danielle Lawrie (CAN) and Monica Abbott (USA) starred in the 2003 World Championship played in Nanjing, China.
The 2011 and 2013 editions of the Junior World Cup (in Cape Town, South Africa; and Brampton, Canada) produced 10 Tokyo 2020 Olympians each for five different nations, more than any other event.
Even the 2019 edition of the tournament had three Olympians on the diamond, with Japan’s Miu Goto and Italians Alexia Lacatena and Giulia Koutsoyanopulos wearing their national team jerseys in Irvine, California, USA.
Lima 2021 and the future of softball
With all that said, we can be sure that the future of softball was on stage at Villa Maria del Triunfo Complex in Lima, Peru in 2021 and it will be interesting to know how many of these players will potentially be present at the Los Angeles Olympic Games in 2028?
Asked in 2021 about the importance of this in the future of her international, and potential Olympic, career, the tournament MVP Valerie Cagle said: “It just gives us a good building block, we have this experience here and we are now able to build confidence on what we’ve done here, so we can take that for the future.”
What about being in the process of developing the new generation of Olympians? “I think that would be amazing, especially for these athletes,” said USA Head Coach Kyla Holas at Lima 2021, who is now in Castions di Strada with the women's national team. “They’ve got now the chance to see what it’s like to wear those letters on your chest, and for them to be able to have a taste of that, know what USA Softball is about, continue developing their game and hopefully get an invite in the future. That would be something that, for all of them, would be a dream come true.”
