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Brandon Moyo, [email protected]

THE Royal Dutch Cricket Association (KNCB) has named a 15-member squad that will represent the Netherlands at the Men’s Cricket World Cup Qualifiers to be played next month in Zimbabwe.

The Dutch will be returning to Zimbabwe having played a three-match One Day International (ODI) series against the Chevrons in March.

They will be without seasoned Colin Ackermann, Fred Klaassen, Paul van Meekeren, Roelof van der Merwe, and the fast-bowling duo of Brandon Glover and Timm van der Gugten due to their English County commitments. The six players have county contracts, which provide players ‘financial security.’

Netherlands Cricket team at Harare Sports Club

The trio of Logan van Beek, Clayton Floyd and Saqib Zulfiqar who last played last year have been recalled to the team.

There are also a couple of new faces to the squad, who include 23-year-old Noah Croes and 19-year-old Michael Levitt who are yet to get a taste of international cricket.

The Netherlands will be playing in the qualifiers after finishing at the bottom of the International Cricket Council (ICC) ODI Super League and will be hoping to secure one of the two remaining slots to the global showpiece which will be held in India in October this year.

In a statement from KNCB, captain Scott Edwards said their previous visit to Zimbabwe helped them in preparation for the qualifiers and is confident that the team they picked will excel in the conditions which they got to experience in March. After the series in Zimbabwe, they went on to play against the Proteas in South Africa.

They lost 2-1 against the Chevrons and 2-0 against the Proteas.

“Coming off the back of a three game series in Zimbabwe a few months ago, we have been really intentional in our preparation for the qualifiers and we are confident the squad we have picked can play a brand of cricket that will be successful in these conditions. We have a good mixture of experienced players along with some exciting young players who have performed well in the domestic Pro Series and club season leading into this tournament,” said Edwards.

The Dutch’s High Performance Manager Roland Lefebvre added that the unavailability of the senior experienced players has opened doors for the youngsters whom he expects to step up. He believes that the side is well balanced and has had good preparations building up to the tournament.

“The Netherlands team selected for the World Cup Qualifiers in Zimbabwe is a well-balanced team, coming off the back of a very successful T20 World Cup in Australia and two competitive Super League series against Zimbabwe and South Africa. The unavailability of several of our more experienced County players has allowed a number of young players to be included in the squad and we look forward to seeing them perform at the highest level,” said Lefebvre.

Netherlands Cricket players

Netherlands is in Group A of the qualifiers alongside West Indies, United States of America (USA), Nepal and the hosts, Zimbabwe. Their first match will be against the Chevrons on Tuesday 20 June before going on to face USA on Thursday 22 June. Their third group encounter will be against Nepal on Saturday 24 June before rounding up their group against the Windies on Monday 26 June.

Netherlands Squad for World Cup Qualifiers: Scott Edwards (captain), Max O’Dowd, Logan van Beek, Vikramjit Singh, Aryan Dutt, Vivian Kingma, Bas de Leede, Noah Croes, Ryan Klein, Teja Nidamanuru, Wesley Barresi, Shariz Ahmad, Clayton Floyd, Michael Levitt, Saqib Zulfiqar. 

— @brandon_malvin