Author: tkcricket

Rod Lyall 21/08/2022

Dosti Amsterdam’s 59-run victory over ACC at Het Loopveld on Saturday took them a further step towards avoiding automatic relegation, but they will still face a difficult expedition to Capelle a/d IJssel next Sunday in their quest for a place in the play-off against the champions of the Hoofdklasse.

Next week’s showdown at the Bermweg was set up by Sparta 1888’s 75-run win over a greatly-weakened VOC Rotterdam on Saturday, which brought the Capelle side level on points with Dosti, although they have played a game more and are therefore behind them on points average.

After winning just one league match in the previous two seasons and losing their first eleven games this year Dosti have now won three in a row, a last-ditch revival which leaves them two wins away from retaining their place in the Topklasse.

Their defeat of ACC owed much to a fourth-wicket stand of 142 between Vinoo Tewarie (64) and Amitoze Singh (82), which enabled them to recover from a precarious 46 for four and reach a competitive 236 for nine.

Mees van Vliet was again the pick of ACC’s bowlers, finishing with three for 45.

The home side began their chase promisingly, Thomas Hobson and Robin Smith putting on 74 for the first wicket, but once Smith, on 65, had been caught at short cover by Tewarie off the bowling of Kuldeep Diwan the middle order fell apart, only Anis Raza with 34 showing any real resistance.

Diwan took five for 34, his best return of the season, and ACC were all out for 177.

At Sportpark Bermweg VOC’s Max Hoornweg marked his return to his former club with a haul of four for 24, enabling his side to restrict Sparta to 156 for eight from their 50 overs.

They seemed to be heading for an even lower total when they collapsed to 93 for eight, but they were rescued by Ahsan Malik and Usman Saleem, not out on 42 and 36 respectively as they shared an unbroken ninth-wicket stand of 63.

Daan van Everdingen, playing first first top-flight match for ten years, gave VOC a solid start with 28, but otherwise only captain Tim de Kok with 21 delayed the Sparta victory for any length of time, Khalid Ahmadi taking four for 16, Joost Martijn Snoep three for 27 and Malik two for 23 as VOC were dismissed for just 83.

Kampong Utrecht’s attempt to avoid automatic relegation came to a disappointing end at Maarschalkerweerd, where they fell 22 runs short of their target as they chased Salland’s 194 for eight.

52 from Sahir Naqash, 31 from opener Venkat Ganesan and 34 from Elam Bharathi enabled Salland to reach their total, Tushar Sharma the most successful of Kampong’s bowlers with three for 32, but stand-in captain Reinder Lubbers, deputising for his brother Victor, removed both openers, and Kampong were in trouble at 36 for three.

Cole Briggs and Vikram Chaturvedi managed a partial revival, but once Akhil Gopinath trapped Briggs in front for 60 the innings again fell apart, and with Gopinath finishing with three for 28 and two wickets apiece for Lubbers, Ganesan and Bharathi, Kampong were all out for 173.

Bertus de Jong & Rod Lyall 18/08/20

Two rounds to go, and there’s a few things we already know for sure. Voorburg will top the table, while VOC, Salland and ACC have secured safety in the lower half. There the battle is now between Dosti, Sparta and Kampong for the one remaining chance to stay up, while at the top of the table HCC, HBS, Excelsior and Punjab are all tied in second on six points. VRA, two points behind the pack, almost certainly need to win both their last matches. The entire round for the top half has been shifted back by a week however, all three matches having been deferred (not without protest in some cases) due to the absence of international players owing to the Pakistan series.

BdJ: With two consecutive wins under their belt, Dosti Amsterdam will have a modicum of momentum on their side as they cross the river to take on ACC in their penultimate match. Dosti find themselves remarkably well placed to stage a last-ditch escape via the relegation play-off, with a points average advantage over Sparta and a NRR lead over both their remaining rivals. Nonetheless they’ll need to win at least one and probably both of their last games to get there. Despite ACC having little left to play for but pride, they are safe for good reason. The principle reason being Mees van Vliet’s remarkable season that’s seen him top the wicket-taking table, and a steady supply of runs from overseas Hobson and Smith. Dosti arguably look the more balanced side however, with a solid roster of spin options and Amitoze Singh finding some form. They will likely need more runs from the rest of the order in the next two weeks if they’re to keep their hopes of another Topklasse season alive however.

RL: Whatever the chemical reaction that has turned Dosti from serial losers to winners of two matches in a row (all right, it’s not much, but everybody has to start somewhere), there should be teams of scientists trying to identify the elements of the process with a view to patenting them. Two more victories would give Mahesh Hans’s side a real chance of staying up, but the close run ACC gave VOC last week should caution them about thinking that their visit to Het Loopveld will be straightforward. On the other hand, after a brilliant start from Smith and Knoll the rest of the ACC batting contributed fewer than a hundred runs against VOC, and although Fergus Wegener has started to look solid in the middle order they may find the going tough against Waheed Masood and Co. Could be close, but Dosti have the wind in their sails.

BdJ: Likewise Kampong have little room for error if they are to secure a second season in the top flight. Taking on Salland this week, it’s not certain what sort of strength side they’ll be welcoming to Utrecht given that Salland have no need of points from here. Kampong will certainly be without Tom Cooper however, who is set to depart after the Pakistan series in any event. Cooper’s 37 last week was Kampong’s top score by a distance, while he and Cole Briggs were the only ones to make significant scores against Salland in their first match. While they have reason to feel somewhat aggrieved at how the format this season has treated them, their batting since the start of the second phase has not helped them either. On paper then another defeat looks likely if they can’t turn their batting around, but with only one team really needing the win there’s every chance this is the game they do it.

RL: Kampong’s real problem is that, a couple of supreme efforts against top sides notwithstanding, they have largely been unable to get the better of the main rivals in the relegation stakes. They have a useful attack, Alex Roy being to them what Van Vliet has been to ACC, but their batting has seldom produced when it really matters. Who Salland will bring to Maarschalkerweerd is, however, the Great Unknown, and should the answer turn out to be the B team then Kampong’s chances of taking the points they so sorely need will be great improved. The best they can hope for now is that play-off place against the Hoofdklasse champions, but even that is preferable to automatic relegation.

BdJ: The day’s final game sees Sparta 1888 take on VOC, and fair to say Sparta will be delighted with the timing. Unlike the other teams who have seen players called up for national duty, VOC have agreed to play on regardless. This is perhaps not unrelated to the fact that as of last week they are safe from relegation and thus for the Bloodhounds the match is a dead rubber. For Sparta the format has thus gifted them a chance to play what for them is a crucial match against arguably the strongest team in the bottom half while the latter is without their two top-scorers and leading wicket-taker. Now on a five-match losing streak, it may still be beyond Sparta to take advantage of their fortune, but with Ahmadi, Malik and Bukhari beginning to find some rhythm with the ball they have the attack to run through a weakened VOC.

RL: Much may depend here on how well Mudassar Bukhari comes back from the leg injury he sustained at Salland last week. That said, even his spinners were effective enough to capture three wickets, and the consequences for his batting are more likely to be an issue – although who would want to bowl to a Bukhari reduced to hitting fours and sixes? In the perennial, never-to-be-resolved debate about playing competition matches when the national team is otherwise engaged, too little weight tends to be given to the opportunity it offers for fringe first-team players to gain experience and state their case, and with VOC now safe and presumably beginning to think about next season, those who often have a minor role in the Topklasse side or seldom get picked at all will get their chance against Sparta to show what they can do. Even without Edwards, O’Dowd and Jain VOC have enough in their locker to prevail over an ailing Sparta, although their absence does indeed level the odds significantly.

BdJ’s picks: Dosti, Kampong, Sparta.
RL’s picks: ACC, Kampong, VOC.

Rod Lyall 15/08/2022

A fighting century by Peter Borren, the tenth of his twenty-year career in the top flight, and a strong defensive effort by the VRA attack carried the Amsterdam side to a 24-run victory over HBS Craeyenhout in the Amsterdamse Bos on Saturday, their second win in successioin keeping alive their faint hopes of reaching the final four.

Borren received little support from the rest of the VRA batting, stands of 73 for the fifth wicket with Aryan Dutt (31) and of 45 for the eighth with Mitch Lees apart, but when HBS began chasing their target of 225 the bowlers responded magnificently.

Dutt was especially disciplined, bowling five maidens in his initial nine-over spell and conceding just ten runs for the wickets of Reece Mason and Wesley Barresi, and then Vikram Singh chimed in, tearing through the HBS middle order and taking four wickets as the visitors were reduced to 69 for six.

Tayo Walbrugh, however, was still there, and Julian de Mey now joined him in a stand of 129 which brought their side back into the game.

But Udit Nashier, Jack Balbirnie and Borren himself all succeeded in restricting the boundaries so effectively that the asking rate kept rising, and when the batters began to accelerate it was Nashier who bowled De Mey for 59, initiating the final collapse which, although Walbrugh reached his fifth century of the season just before the end, saw HBS dismissed for 200 of the last ball of their 50 overs.

HCC, meanwhile, took full advantage of the HBS defeat with a 69-run victory over Voorburg at Westvliet which enabled them to leapfrog into second place on the table, greatly improving their chances of securing a double crack at reaching the grand final on 10 September.

A second-wicket stand of 147 between Tonny Staal (78) and Zac Worden (55) was the basis of HCC’s total of 224 for six, Boris Gorlee chipping in with a run-a-ball 31 and Viv Kingma the most successful of the Voorburg bowlers with three for 30.

Then seamer Felix Bennett, in only his sixth Topklasse match, ran through the powerful Voorburg batting line-up, taking six for 27 as the home side collapsed to 155 all out.

Bas de Leede again fought a rearguard action, making a 90-ball 57 and sharing a 72-run stand for the fifth wicket with Shariz Ahmad (35), but this time was on the losing side as Voorburg dropped their first points in the championship pool.

Yet another century by Jonathan Vandiar, his third in four innings, saw Punjab Rotterdam to 253 for five against Excelsior ’20 at Thurlede, Teja Nidamanuru making 37 and Sikander Zulfiqar 48 not out, and after three times failing to defend larger totals the Punjab bowlers returned to their winning ways as they dismissed Excelsior for 141.

Nidamanuru did the initial damage with a nine-over spell in which he took four for 22, and then Saqib Zulfiqar claimed three for 54, ending a dogged innings of 30 by Roel Verhagen, while Vandiar and Asad Zulfiqar combined to run out Brett Hampton, whose 30-ball 32 had been Excelsior’s last hope of a successful chase.

In the relegation pool, Dosti Amsterdam improved their chances of avoiding the two automatic places leading to next season’s Hoofdklasse with a six-wicket defeat of Kampong Utrecht at Sportpark Drieburg.

Waheed Masood took three for 25, Kuldeep Diwan three for 27 and Asief Hoseinbaks and Waqas Raja two wickets apiece as Kampong were dismissed for 112, Tom Cooper top-scoring with 37.

Raja then led the reply with 38, and Dosti needed only 21.2 overs to knock off the runs.

In a hard-fought match at Het Loopveld ACC got off to a remarkable start against VOC Rotterdam, Robin Smith (57) and Chris Knoll (69) putting on 111 for the first wicket at eight and a half an over, but the Rotterdammers were brought back into the game by Matt Smit, who removed both openers and finished with three for 53 and by the unlikely person of Scott Edwards, converted from wicketkeeper to spinner, who ran through the middle order to the tune of three for 33.

Siebe van Wingerden finished things off with three for 27, and ACC were all out for 226.

VOC were in trouble at 69 for four, 40 of them from the bat of Smit, but they were rescued by the depth of their batting, Tim de Kok making 44, Edwards (batting at six) contributing a quick 23, Corey Rutgers adding 32, and then Jelte Schoonheim, who had engineered last week’s victory over Kampong with a fine spell with the ball, hitting a 35-ball 59 not out to see VOC home by two wickets with six overs to spare.

At Het Schootsveld on Sunday Sparta 1888’s relegation woes deepened despite a much-improved effort with the bat, as they lost to Salland Deventer by three wickets in a harfd-fought game.

They were given a decent start by Craig Ambrose (31) and Raza Noor (43), and then Samit Gohil (32) and Mudassar Bukhari (23) took them on to 135 for two.

But once Bukhari, hampered by a leg strain, was dismissed, soon followed by Gohil, the wickets again began to tumble, the last eight wickets falling for 52 as they were dismissed for 187, Akhil Gopinath taking four for 34.

Some wayward bowling from Sparta aided Salland’s chase, but after Khalid Ahmadi had removed both openers Bukhari, bowling spin off a couple of steps, grabbed three wickets, and the game was evenly balanced with Salland on 129 for five.

They were rescued by a brisk 59 from Sahir Naqash, and although Ahsan Malik, who conceded just 22 from his ten overs, returned to remove Naqash and Gijs van Molen, Salland reached their target with more than ten overs to spare.

Now bottom of the table on points average and with a worse net run rate than their rivals, Sparta will need a radical reversal of form if they are to have any chance of avoiding the drop to the Hoofdklasse.