Daily Times

LAHORE: The Netherlands clinched a place at the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023 with a dramatic victory over Scotland and now skipper Scott Edwards has set his sights on winning the Qualifier. Heroics from Bas de Leede, who hit a maiden ODI century after taking his first five-wicket haul, helped the Dutch to a four-wicket win over Scotland, chasing down the target inside 44 overs to overtake their opponents’ net run-rate. That clinched second spot in the Super Six and a place at the World Cup, and now the Netherlands will look to finish the tournament by becoming the first team to beat Sri Lanka. The 1996 World Cup winners have won seven out of seven in Zimbabwe, most recently cruising to an eight-wicket win over the West Indies.

But despite the size of the task facing his team, Edwards is greedy for more success. He said: “Going into the tournament, qualifying was part of it, but we wanted to win the tournament. So once we celebrated qualifying, we’ve moved straight onto preparing for this game and we’re looking forward to hopefully playing a good game of cricket tomorrow.” Edwards scored an unbeaten 67 the first time the sides met, Sri Lanka winning by 21 runs despite being held to just 213 batting first. That was one of the few games in which Dutch openers Max O’Dowd and Vikramjit Singh had failed to fire, both going for ducks – and Edwards admits that it was the batting that was the issue in that Super Six clash. He added: “As a batting group, we know we have got to play better than we did last time against them. Hopefully we can show that we are a better batting unit than we did the last time. Throughout the tournament, Max and Vikram have been sensational, probably two of the better openers at this tournament so for us, they have played a massive part in us qualifying and hopefully they can keep doing what they are doing and set the platform for us.”

Sri Lanka have lived up to their billing as one of the pre-tournament favourites, with that win over the Netherlands, the closest any team has come against them. Skipper Dasun Shanaka revealed that the squad will be at full strength for the final in Harare and is confident they can wrap up the tournament with a final win. He said: “As a full member country, it’s important to win this series and the way we have played in this tournament, I am sure we will do well and win. What is important is to continue the winning streak while controlling our strengths.” As well as meeting in the Super Six, the teams also played a warm-up match against one another, and Shanaka has been impressed by the Dutch in those two meetings, particularly their ability to play the situation of a game to perfection.