Baseball5 is set to feature at the 2023 African Beach Games ©WBSC

Baseball5 is poised to feature at the next African Beach Games after the Executive Committee of the Association of National Olympic Committees of Africa (ANOCA) endorsed it being added as a full medal event.

A resolution that the "ANOCA Executive Committee endorses the participation of Baseball5 as a competitive sport at the African Beach Games 2023 in Tunisia" has been passed.

Tunisia was confirmed as the second host of the African Beach Games in December 2020, following Sal in Cape Verde organising the inaugural event in 2019.

Eleven sports were contested in Cape Verde, but none were disciplines of baseball-softball.

However, ANOCA has resolved to add Baseball5 to the 2023 sport programme.


World Baseball Softball Confederation President Riccardo Fraccari attended last month's celebration of ANOCA's 40h anniversary in Nigeria, and gave a presentation on Baseball5 to the Executive Committee.

The pitcher-free discipline requires only a rubber ball to play and no bat, so is designed to bring baseball to previously inaccessible areas.

Any playing surface can be used and hitting is done by hand.

Baseball5, which can be played as a mixed-gender sport with five players on each team, has been added to the programme for the 2026 Summer Youth Olympic Games in Dakar in Senegal, and the WBSC has also launched World Cups for the discipline.