Baseball: Y. Takahashi homers twice as Yomiuri regains CL lead

Yoshinobu Takahashi hit two of his team's four home runs off Kenshin Kawakami as the Yomiuri Giants overtook the Chunichi Dragons for first place in the Central League with a 6-3 win on Thursday.

Lee Seung Yeop, Takahashi and Shinnosuke Abe each hit a solo homer between the third and fifth innings to erase a 3-0 deficit before Takahashi's two-run shot over the left-field wall put Yomiuri ahead 5-3 in the sixth at Tokyo Dome.

Tetsuya Utsumi (12-5) allowed three runs and eight hits in 6-2/3 innings. Kawakami (10-7) was charged with five runs and five hits in six innings.

Yoshitomo Tani doubled in an insurance run for Yomiuri in the seventh. Norihiro Nakamura hit a two-run homer to cap Chunichi's three-run third.

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Swallows 8, Tigers 1

Yuichi Matsumoto went 4-for-4 with a grand slam and six RBIs in his first top-team appearance of the season as Yakult routed Hanshin to snap a three-game losing streak.

Matsumoto hit a grand slam off Naohisa Sugiyama (4-5) to push Yakult's lead to 5-0 in the third inning and added a two-run single in the seventh at Jingu Stadium. The Brazilian-born outfielder had singles in his other two at-bats.

Seth Greisinger (13-4) became the first 13-game winner in the league after holding Hanshin to one run and three hits in 6-2/3 innings.