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Brandon Moyo, Sports Reporter
ZIMBABWE is expected to field a full strength side when they face Netherlands in a white ball series next month at Harare Sports Club.

In the last couple of series, Zimbabwe have been missing players due to injuries as well as international franchise cricket commitments and team captain Craig Ervine believes all the missing players will be available when the Dutch land in Zimbabwe.

Some of the players missed by Zimbabwe over the previous matches are Sean Williams (injury), Sikandar Raza (franchise commitments), Blessing Muzarabani (injury) and Ryan Burl (franchise commitments). Gary Ballance also missed the last Test match between Zimbabwe and West Indies at Queens Sports Club due to a migraine headache.

Speaking at a press conference after the recently ended Test series against West Indies, Ervine said he expects that the missing players will be back in the national colours come the Netherlands tour.

Gary Ballance

“With the Netherlands series that is a few weeks away, I am pretty sure that Blessing Muzarabani would be back and fit, Sikandar Raza should be back, Ryan Burl should be back, Sean Williams would have recovered from his fractured finger and Gary Ballance will be back so I’m sure that come the Netherlands tour we will have a full-strength squad,” said Ervine.

The tour is the last on the calendar for Zimbabwe at home before they take part in the International Cricket Council (ICC) 2023 World Cup Qualifiers which they will be hosting between June and July.

Ervine said the visit to Zimbabwe by Netherlands is important for them as they prepare to take part in the qualifiers for the global showpiece which will take place in India in October and also build some momentum.

Craig Ervine

“It’s really important because as you saw at the back end of last year, we created some really good momentum leading up to the World Cup and continued that through the World Cup so any games that we do play are really important leading up to the qualifiers because if you are winning you get into that winning mentality and it’s something that we can make a habit of,” he said.

This will be Zimbabwe’s third international assignment of the year having gotten off to a T20I and ODI series against Ireland in Harare last month. After taking on Ireland, Zimbabwe followed that up with a two-Test square off against West Indies in Bulawayo which ended on Tuesday with the Windies winning the series 1-0 after winning the second

Test by an innings and four runs following a drawn first five-day contest. From Zimbabwe, West Indies are heading to South Africa.

West Indies celebrate one of Gudakesh Motie’s wickets

According to the Chevrons’ Future Tours Programme (FTP) schedule, another home series will be played against Ireland at the end of the year and will consist of one Test, three ODIs and three T20s. This will be followed by an away series in Sri Lanka in January 2024 for three ODIs and T20s.The Netherlands tour will be made up of three One Day Internationals (ODIs) and the final dates for the series are yet to be confirmed by both bodies. – @brandon_malvin