'The Flying Dutch' always need a captain as was a saying in the 'Pirates of the Caribbean'. And Scott Edwards turned out to be that match-winning captain against South Africa in Dharamsala last night! With an unbeaten 69-ball 78* along with 3 catches as keeper, Edwards took his team to a maiden ODI World Cup victory!
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| Image Credits: ESPN Cricinfo |
Rain played spoilsport at the beginning of the match and delayed the proceedings! The match eventually started with around a 2-hour delay and it was shortened to 43 overs each with South Africa winning the toss and opting to bowl first!
The Netherlands were reduced to 140/7 in the 34th over and were probably staring down at another heart-breaking defeat! However, things did take a turn in the right direction for them with captain Scott Edwards making an unbeaten 78* runs off just 69 runs. His 64-run stand for the 8th wicket with Roelof van der Merwe (29 off 19) helped them get past the 200 mark.
Aryan Dutt at no. 10 played an innings of his lifetime scoring an unbeaten 23* runs off just 9 deliveries which included 3 sixes. The Netherlands, as a result, made 245/8 in their quota of 43 overs. Surprisingly, South Africa conceded 32 extras in this match as the winning margin for the Netherlands was just 38 runs!
During the run-chase, South Africa's top four batters left the crease one after the other with the scorecard reading just 44/4 in the 12th over. David Miller (43 off 52) and Heinrich Klassen (28 off 28) made crucial contributions later but weren't enough!
Keshav Maharaj made 40 off 37 deliveries at the end but that knock was only to help South Africa not to lose too much on their Net Run Rate! Proteas were eventually bowled out for 207 runs with a ball left in their innings, conceding a 38-run victory!
Incidentally, the Netherlands earlier defeated South Africa in the group stage match of T20 World Cup 2022 which cost Proteas a place in the semi-final of the tournament!
Brief Scores: Netherlands - 245/8 in 43 overs (Scott Edwards - 78*, Macro Jansen - 2/27) defeated South Africa - 207 all out in 42.5 overs (David Miller - 43, Logan van Beek - 3/60) by a margin of 38 runs
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