BEIJING — Injuries, hot tempers, ejections and a beanball war.

Not exactly what the crowd of 7,563 mostly Chinese fans thought they’d see when Team USA took on the host country in baseball.

They got all that and more as the U.S. notched an emotional 9-1 victory in Olympic round-robin play at Wukesong Baseball Field.

The U.S. outhit China 9-3 with bats and 2-0 in home-plate collisions. China’s pitchers outdid Team USA’s in hitting batters, 5-2.

China lost starting catcher Wang Wei to a leg injury.

Team USA lost right fielder Matt LaPorta, who was nailed by a pitch in the head and was diagnosed with a mild concussion.

“Emotions run high in the game of baseball,” said Davey Johnson, Team USA’s manager.

No kidding.

Lost in the commotion was that the United States (3-2) virtually clinched a spot in the semifinals, joined by Cuba, South Korea and Japan. China, Canada, the Netherlands and Taiwan are virtually eliminated, all with 1-4 records.

The Americans, designated as the home team, led 1-0 through 4 ? innings.

John Gall’s RBI double in the bottom of the fourth made it 2-0, and LaPorta drew a walk.

Taylor Teagarden drove Gall and LaPorta home with a double down the right-field line. LaPorta crashed into Wang, who earlier in the game had taken a foul tip off his foot. This time, he was unable to continue.

The next batter, Jason Donald, was hit by a pitch for his second consecutive at-bat.

An inning later, Team USA’s Nate Schierholtz bowled over Wang’s replacement, Yang Yang, scoring from third on a sacrifice fly to short center.

Chinese manager Jim Lefebvre, the former major-leaguer, had words for Schierholtz and then set after plate umpire Edwin van den Berk of the Netherlands for not ejecting Schierholtz. Yang was OK, but Lefebvre was not. He was ejected.

“It was a hard play at the plate where we lost our (starting) catcher,” Lefebvre said. “Just hard baseball, that’s all. But I thought the other slide (by Schierholtz) was too high. In the States, you try to do that, you’re ejected. He ejected me from the game and the umpire let the game get away. That’s all there was to it.”

Schierholtz, a Giants prospect with Triple-A Fresno, defended his play.

“I figured there’d be a play and he blocked the plate, so I did what I had to do to score the run,” he said. “It was a close game at the time … and we’ve been playing close games, so I knew we needed the run. I wasn’t trying to take him out.”

Had the throw from center not been cut off at the mound, Schierholtz said, “nobody would have said anything” because the play would have been close.

Johnson said plate collisions are an accepted part of the game, and he has the aches to prove it.

“My left shoulder’s still bad from having to run over catchers that were in front of home plate,” he said. “You slide into them, they’ve got shin guards. That’s even worse.”

Now leading 5-0, LaPorta led off the seventh inning. Relief pitcher Chen Kun stuck a fastball in LaPorta’s ear-hole, sending him to the ground and out of the game. Johnson said LaPorta told him he was OK, but the manager had LaPorta taken to a nearby hospital for a CAT scan. Chen was ejected.

“It was pretty brutal to throw at a guy’s head,” Schierholtz said. “I mean, you can hit guys in other places.”

Such a situation in a minor-league game would result in a bench-clearing brawl, Schierholtz said. “We would have charged for sure, no question. You hit five guys and you hit one of our leaders, you’re gonna pay for it. But it’s a little different here, I guess. The tempers were high and I don’t know what the implications for everything are here.”

Lefebvre denied that Chen deliberately beaned LaPorta.

“We do not throw to hit people. … We don’t teach that in China, we don’t teach that in the United States,” Lefebvre said. “He tried to throw the ball inside and it got away from him.”

Schierholtz led Team USA with two hits, two runs and three RBI. Terry Tiffee also had two of the Americans’ nine hits, including his sixth double of the tournament. That ties the U.S. Olympic record set by Brett Abernathy of the 2000 Sydney gold-medal team.

Jake Arrieta and three relievers combined on a four-hitter. China’s lone run came when Yang launched a ninth-inning 1-1 pitch into the left-field stands.

He circled the bases with his hand raised, signaling “No. 1,” and stomped on home plate.

“We don’t do that in the United States,” Johnson said. “But their (fourth) hit of the game, I was happy for him. He’s a backup catcher and it’s probably the biggest hit he’s got in his life. It didn’t bother me at all.”

All teams have two games remaining in round-robin play. The U.S. will take on Taiwan on Tuesday and Japan on Wednesday. China finishes up with Japan and Cuba.