The U.S. softball team continued their solo show here on Saturday as three-time defending champions shut out Chinese Taipei 7-0 to rack up their five consecutive victories at Beijing Olympics.

Jessica Mendoza started the day by hitting a long double to send Caitlin Lowe home with the first run for the Americans.

A hot batting Jessica hit a home run in the third inning, then igniting a five run outburst by the USA.

The seventh run came in the fourth inning, when Lauren Lappin singled Victoria Galindo home.

USA's pinup blonde pitcher Jennie Finch presided over a game halted after five innings for the second time of the tournament, which is under the "Run Ahead Rule."

The rule provides that a game will be declared complete and over after five innings if one team leads the other by seven or more run.

Up to now, the U.S. "dream team" has not lost a game in Olympic competition since its 2-1 defeat at Australian's bats at the Sydney Games in 2000.

The morning's clash between the top two Asian squads was pivotal for both sides to continue on course to the medal podium.

Japan's ace hurler Yukiko Ueno made her first start of the tournament, aiming to suppress Chinese batters with her thrilling speed. Ueno's pitch is known as one of the fastest in the world and has been recorded as being as fast as 177km/h.

The Japanese jumped in front early in the top of third inning when Rie Sato delivered a three-run homer to take a 3-0 lead.

China had to replace their starter Lu Wei with lefty reliefer Li Qi onto the circle in the fourth inning.

Li took good care of the following innings. She retired four batters and allowed only one hit but no runs.

From the plate, China contributed six hits in the whole game, bettering the opponent with four, yet no runs were put across home plate by Chinese desperate batters.

China's head coach Wang Lihong still praised her heartbroken girls after the game.

"Although we lost the game, we did a very job today, especially in front of their best pitcher Ueno.

"Six hits is also the best results we have achieved in the past battles with this pitcher. We just fail to make runs. It's a pity," said Wang.

With a won-lost record of 2-3, China will face Chinese Taipei on Sunday and meet the undefeated USA one day later.

"No matter what the result is, we will fight to the end. This is our last show in Olympic arena and we will cherish every inning in each game." said China's center fielder Zhou Yi.

If China could achieve two straight wins in miracle, the fate is still not in her hands.

In the other two games, Australia whitewashed Chinese Taipei 8-0 and Venezuela upset Canada 2-0.

The eight teams now are competing in a round-robin format at the preliminaries and only the top four winners will contest for medals in the page system.

After the fifth round competitions ended on Saturday, USA (5-0), Japan (4-1), Australia (3-2), Canada (3-2) now lead the standings.

Source: xinhua