Softball Softball is a game similar to baseball played with a larger ball on a smaller field. Softball is played competitively at club levels, the college level, and the professional level. The game was first created in 1887 in Chicago by George Hanc ...

at the 2008 Summer Olympics in

Beijing } Beijing ( ; ; ), alternatively romanized as Peking ( ), is the capital of the People's Republic of China. It is the center of power and development of the country. Beijing is the world's most populous national capital city, with over 21 ...

took place over a ten-day period starting August 12 and culminating in the medal finals on August 21. All games were played at the

Fengtai Softball Field Fengtai Softball Field, or Fengtai Sports Center Softball Field (), is a softball stadium located in Beijing, China. It hosted the softball competitions at the 2008 Summer Olympics. The complex consists of two competition grounds and one training ...

. Olympic softball is a women only competition, with men competing in the similar sport of

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding t ...

. This is the most recently contested softball tournament in Olympic history, as the

International Olympic Committee The International Olympic Committee (IOC; french: link=no, Comité international olympique, ''CIO'') is a non-governmental sports organisation based in Lausanne, Switzerland. It is constituted in the form of an association under the Swiss ...

voted to remove baseball from the program in the 2012 Olympics. Along with

, softball was rejected for inclusion in the 2016 Summer Olympics at the IOC's meeting in October 2009. However, following a 2016 IOC vote, softball was included for the 2020 Games.

Medalists

Participants

* * * * * * * *

Competition format

Eight teams compete in the Olympic softball tournament, and the competition consists of two rounds. The preliminary round follows a round robin format, where each of the teams plays all the other teams once. Following this, the top four teams advance to a

page playoff system The Page playoff system is a playoff format used primarily in softball and curling at the championship level, the Indian Premier League and Pakistan Super League cricket tournaments. Teams are seeded using a round-robin tournament and the top f ...

round consisting of two semifinal games, and finally the bronze and gold medal games.

Qualification

The eight teams in the Olympic softball tournament will qualify through a series of tournaments. China, as the host nation, is guaranteed one automatic entry. The top four finalists at the 2006 Softball World Championships will be qualified for the Olympic tournament. Finally, there will be continental qualifying tournaments for Europe/Africa, Pan-America, and Asia/Oceania, with the winners of each tournament earning a spot in the Olympic tournament.

Qualification schedule

'': '' Chinese Taipei is the official IOC designation for the state officially referred to as the Republic of China, more commonly known as

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...

. (See also political status of Taiwan for details.)

Group stage

Preliminary round

The top four teams will advance to the semifinal round. All times are

China Standard Time The time in China follows a single standard time offset of UTC+08:00 (eight hours ahead of Coordinated Universal Time), even though the country spans almost five geographical time zones. The official national standard time is called ''Beijing T ...

(

UTC+8 UTC+08:00 is an identifier for a time offset from UTC of +08:00. With an estimated population of 1.708 billion living within the time zone, roughly 24% of the world population, it is the most populous time zone in the world, as well as a ...

) Tiebreaking procedures follow the International Softball Federation's standard procedure for the resolution of ties.
;August 12

;August 13

;August 14

;August 15

;August 16

;August 17

;August 18

Medal round

The loser of 1&2 seed game will play the winner of the 3&4 seed game in the bronze medal match. The loser of the bronze medal match wins the bronze medal while the winner goes on to play the winner of the 1&2 seed game for the gold medal in the gold medal match.

Semi finals

Bronze medal match

Winner advances to gold medal match. Loser wins bronze medal.

Gold medal match

References

External links

IOC SoftballInternational Softball FederationISF Olympic SoftballSoftball – Official Results Book
{{DEFAULTSORT:Softball At The 2008 Summer Olympics 2008 Summer Olympics events

2008 File:2008 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: Lehman Brothers went bankrupt following the Subprime mortgage crisis; Cyclone Nargis killed more than 138,000 in Myanmar; A scene from the opening ceremony of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing; ...

2008 in softball Softball at the 2008 Summer Olympics Softball competitions in China