This Friday, the Cuban baseball team faced Panama on the innaugural day of the PanAmerican Youth Baseball Championships that is taking place until 14 September in the town of La Paz in the Mexican state of Baja California Sur.

Under the command of laureate mentor, Luis Cuba, the Cuban squad will have in its debut, the services of promising left-hander, Cionel Pérez, of high performance with the Crocodiles of Matanzas in the last edition of the National Series of Baseball.

After the confrontation with the Panamanian team, in the following days the Cuban team will battle selected teams of Venezuela, Brazil, Canada, Mexico, Guatemala, Ecuador and the United States before closing the qualifying stage, against Argentina on Saturday 13 September.

Scheduled to be held by the competitive system of 'all against all', the Pan American Junior Baseball Championship will award four tickets to the world competition next year, in Japan.

The top two teams from the preliminary round will face off for the title of the competition on Sunday 14 September, while the third and fourth places will struggle for the bronze medals on the same day.

Volleyball

The male Cuban volleyball team on Friday had its first victory in the World Volleyball Championship taking place in various cities in Poland, after beating South Korea 3-1 in group B which venue is in Katowice.

According to the competition website, the Cubans scored three sets to one, highlighting Osmany Uriarte, top scorer of the match with 17 points, 16 of these in the attack and one on the block.

Also standing out for Cuba, Félix Emilio Chapman, who accumulated 14 points in attack,7 in block and 2 in service, followed by Javier Ernesto Jiménez (12-9-1-2) and Rolando Cepeda (10-6-1-3), while for the South Koreans, Park Chul-Woo (14-12-0-2) stood out.

The challenge statisics reflected the Cuban superiority in the attack (46 points to 38) and the block (15-4), and in service they were equal (6-6),

This triumph is very important for the disciples of Rodolfo Sánchez, in the search for classification for the next phase, in which will be the four top teams from the four preliminary groups.

The current league table for group B (waiting for today's other results);Brazil leads with 6 points – 2 wins and no losses, followed by Finland (5-2-0), Cuba (4-1-2), Germany (3-1-1), South Korea (3-1-2) and Tunisia (0-0-2).

The Germans face Tunisia and the defending champions, Brazil, face Finland.

Saturday, The Cubans will have another important game against Tunisia, which they need to win to maintain the possibility of advancement to the following stage, having already filed losses against Finland and Germany, with 2-3 and 0-3 scores, respectively.

This situation is tied to the closing date of the qualifying -Sunday- when the Cubans meet Brazil.

Friday, Bulgaria beat China 3-0 (25-23, 25-23 y 25-19) in group C which will end with matches between Canada-Egypt and Russia-Mexico.

Badminton

The Cuban badminton player, Osleni Guerrero, continues his training in Spain with views to Belgian Open tournament to be held from 12th September.

Alexis Ramirez, national commissioner of the discipline has said that this event will have a lot of quality, as it will feature a number of European and Asian players.

He said than for Guerrero, it will be a good opportunity to warm-up in order to arrive, in the best sports form, at the Central American and Caribbean Games in Veracruz, Mexico, in November.

In this competition, Cuba hopes to win two crowns, in the men's individual category, and the doubles.

Ramirez confirmed that the other members of the national preselection have a training base in Cienfuegos, in preparation for the Panamerican Festival based in Querétaro, Mexico, from 11 to 16 September.

Those currently shortlisted have an average age of 17 years for women, and for men 19.

Of that group, consisting of eight players will be present on Mexican soil, three boys and an equal number of females.

Guerrero, according to the latest update of the International Federation, is in the 47th place in the badminton world rank with 29th3h30 points,, and he continues to be the leading exponent of the American continent.