Category: Review

Rod Lyall 19/07/21

Amsterdam’s Topklasse clubs have had a mostly disappointing season so far, but two of them produced outstanding results on Sunday, ACC beating VOC Rotterdam and VRA inflicting only their second defeat of the campaign on leaders Punjab.

Winning the toss and electing to bat, VRA were given a great start by opener Vikram Singh, who took on Punjab’s normally parsimonious seam attack to the tune of a 38-ball 57 which included nine fours and two sixes.

The rest of the batting was unable to maintain such momentum, and at 127 for five it seemed that the Amsterdam side might be on the road to another disappointing total.

But then Jack Balbirnie, who had been involved in a useful stand with Peter Borren (28), was joined by Leon Turmaine, and this pair added 78 for the sixth wicket before Balbirnie, on 66, was caught on the midwicket boundary by Yasir Usman off the bowling of Suleiman Tariq.

Turmaine went on to reach 51 before he was run out in the final over, trying to retain the strike, and the innings closed on 232, the highest total of the day.

VRA’s pace men, Quirijn Gunning and Ashir Abid, made the most of the opportunity to defend a substantial score, and with help from spinner Luke Hartsink and seamer Singh, steadily reduced Punjab’s powerful batting line-up to an unwonted 94 for seven.

At this point Imran ul Haq joined skipper Tariq, and together they set about reducing the deficit, adding 73 and bringing the score to within 66 of their target before Hartsink returned to bowl Tariq for 37, his highest Topklasse score. Hartsink finished with three for 45.

Ul Haq continued in company with Sohail Bhatti, adding another 28 runs and bringing his own tally to 39, but once he fell to Leon Turmaine the way was clear for Peter Borren to finish it off and Punjab were dismissed for 196, giving VRA a 36-run victory which kept alive their hopes of reaching the play-offs.

It was much closer at Het Loopveld, where ACC pulled off the unlikely feat of defending their slim total of 150 to beat VOC by 17 runs.

ACC had to battle all the way after being put in by their opponents, Ramdas Upadhyaya taking three for 22, but Ram Ramesh Babu’s patient 48 enabled them to reach 150.

Even so, it seemed unlikely to be enough, especially when Scott Edwards and Max O’Dowd began in aggressive mood.

But Mies van Vliet bowled Edwards for 15, and although O’Dowd delivered another solid innings he received little support from the rest of the upper and middle order, and with Anthony Alangara Napoleon taking four for 28 VOC declined from 83 for two to 133 all out.

O’Dowd was the eighth to go, having made 76, but once Sahil Kothari had removed him with 23 still needed he went on to take the final two wickets and finish with three for 18.

HCC, meanwhile, moved back into second place on the table with a six-wicket victory at De Diepput over an HBS Craeyenhout side depleted by the absence of key overseas players Tayo Walbrugh and Ryan Klein, who had both tested positive for Covid-19.

Hidde Overdijk ripped through the HBS top order, bowling his ten overs unchanged to finish with four for 27, and then Olivier Klaus took over, his three for 11, along with Clayton Floyd’s two for 3, ensuring that HBS were bundled out for 80.

The Craeyenhout side went down fighting, taking four wickets before HCC overhauled their score, but an aggressive 24 not out from Overdijk saw HCC home in just 19.3 overs.

At Sportpark Bermweg Voorburg stayed level on points with HCC, nine points behind Punjab, with a six-wicket victory over Sparta 1888.

Sparta started promisingly enough, a second-wicket stand of 92 between Randeep Deol (29) and Garnett Tarr (57) setting them on course to a decent total, but after they were dismissed in quick succession another batting collapse followed, Stef Mulder and Aryan Dutt taking three for 32 and three for 29 respectively as they were dismissed for 151.

Mohit Hingorani and Tom de Grooth gave Voorburg’s response a solid beginning, and De Grooth went on to anchor the innings, his 76 taking his side to within four runs of their target before he was bowled by Kux Kwinana.

Dutt, though, was still there, and he ended on 34 not out as Voorburg won with more than eleven overs to spare.

Excelsior ’20 Schiedam made short work of Dosti Amsterdam at Sportpark Drieburg, winning by eight wickets and moving into fourth place on the table on net run rate.

A solid bowling performance, with Niels Etman, Klaas Roelfsema, Tristan Stubbs, Remco van Bochove and Lorenzo Ingram each collecting two wickets, saw Dosti dismissed for 109 after Rahil Ahmed and Mahesh Hans had reached 40 without loss, and Roel Verhagen’s 42-ball 49 and Ingram’s not-out 30 took Excelsior to the win in just 14.4 overs.

Rod Lyall 12/07/21

A fine all-round performance by Julian de Mey propelled HBS Craeyenhout to a nine-wicket victory over bottom side Dosti-United Amsterdam on Sunday, taking them into second place on the table, ten points behind leaders Punjab Amsterdam.

De Mey broke open the fragile Dosti batting line-up by removing the dangerous Rahil Ahmed when he had made a 32-ball 37, and went on to take two more, finishing with three for 29 from his ten overs. He was well backed up by young Benno Boddendijk, who cleaned up the tail and ended with four for 15.

Their efforts were instrumental in bowling Dosti out for a mere 128, the last five wickets falling for just 15 runs, and then Tobias Visée and De Mey put on 71 in an opening stand which took only twelve and a half overs.

Visée fell to a splendid catch by Vinoo Tewarie at short extra cover when he had made 44 from 36 deliveries, but as HBS neared their target De Mey launched a series of onslaughts on Mahesh Hans, ending on 47 not out as back-to-back boundaries took his side to the win with more than 30 overs to spare. There was also time for Tayo Walbrugh to add another 20 to his imposing aggregate for the season.

In Saturday’s four games, three of them seriously affected by the weather, the outstanding highlight was an unbroken third-wicket partnership of 237 between Lorenzo Ingram and Tristan Stubbs which enabled Excelsior ’20 Schiedam to run up 295 for two against ACC at Thurlede.

Coming together at 58 for two, Ingram and Stubbs were held in check for much of the innings by a persistent ACC attack, but with plenty of wickets in hand the overseas pair unleashed towards the end, 101 runs coming from the final seven overs as the batters cashed in on their earlier caution.

Ingram ended on 114 not out, his second century of the season coming from 142 deliveries, while Stubbs’s first three-figure haul in the Topklasse took just 98 balls and included six fours and five sixes.

A prolonged period of rain threatened to terminate the game there, but improved conditions enabled the players to return, with ACC set the near-impossible task of making 207 from 28 overs.

Continuing their complete hold on the game, Ingram and Stubbs promptly reduced the Amsterdammers to 23 for four, Ingram taking three for 6 in six overs, and ACC were content to bat out the remaining overs, Ammar Zaidi facing 86 deliveries for 13 not out as his side closed on 51 for six.

It could perhaps have been interpreted as a protest against the unfairness of their situation, had they not batted for 49.1 overs for 85 the week before, chasing an HBS total of 198 for seven.

Leaders Punjab staged a successful comeback against VOC Rotterdam at the Hazelaarweg, after Max O’Dowd and Scott Edwards (59) had put on 106 in an opening stand which gave the challengers an initial advantage.

O’Dowd batted on after Edwards’s departure, but with wickets falling regularly at the other end, three of them to Saqib Zulfiqar’s leg-spin at a cost of 35 runs, it was increasingly clear that VOC’s hopes of setting a big target depended almost entirely upon him.

He was eventually dismissed for 87 by Suleiman Tariq, whose three wickets cost 47 runs, and VOC were all out for 210.

Punjab’s reply was just getting under way as the rain arrived, and when it had passed they were faced with a revised target of 157 from 32 overs.

Another solid performance from the top order saw them home with four overs to spare, Steph Myburgh making 35 and Rehmat Zulfiqar 27 before Asad Zulfiqar and Teja Nidamanuru took their side to the brink of victory.

Nidamanuru fell for 43 with five still needed, but Asad remained 44 not out, his brother Sikander coming to the crease to hit the winning boundary.

Voorburg, second on Saturday morning, also saw their challenge falter, as HCC bowled them out for 132 at Westvliet and went on to win by five wickets in another DLS result.

Veteran former international Tom de Grooth top-scored for Voorburg with a steady 30, but Ollie Klaus took three for 49 and Clayton Floyd five for 18 – consolidating his position as the competition’s leading wicket-taker – as the home side’s batting again subsided.

Bas de Leede and Karl Nieuwoudt hit back hard when HCC replied, and with Tonny Staal, Musa Ahmad and Boris Gorlee all back in the pavilion and only 30 on the board, the Lions found themselves in a precarious situation as the rain arrived.

Their target adjusted to 102 from 27 overs, Damian Crowley and Hidde Overdijk were equal to the task, however, and although De Leede returned to remove Crowley for 41 and Daniël Trijzelaar with successive deliveries with seven still needed, Overdijk remained to finish the job, ending on 35 not out.

De Leede took four for 15, his best return for the season.

The only match to escape Saturday’s rain was in the Amsterdamse Bos, where VRA Amsterdam dismissed Sparta 1888 for 175 and won by seven wickets.

Sparta’s innings started promisingly enough, but Vikram Singh removed both Garnett Tarr (26) and Mudassar Bukhari (31) to ensure that there was no repeat of the Capelle side’s runfest against VOC, and although the lower order chipped in, the rest of the VRA did as well, the six remaining bowlers all claiming a wicket in support of Singh’s three for 24.

Half-century partnerships between Eric Szwarczynski, who made an unbeaten 54, and Jack Balbirnie (37) and then between Szwarczynski and Peter Borren (46 not out) enabled VRA to cruise home, the winning runs coming with more than 20 overs to spare.

The victory gives VRA at least a theoretical chance of reaching the play-offs, although with six points separating them from sixth-placed Excelsior they cannot afford any more slip-ups, and would need other results to go their way.

Rod Lyall 28/06/21

A superb third-wicket stand of 196 by Garnett Tarr and Mudassar Bukhari for Sparta 1888 against VOC Rotterdam on Saturday enabled the Capelle side to reach 316 for eight, far and away their best total of the season, and set up a 95-run victory.

The defeat for VOC, their third in five games, saw them slip back into the peloton of chasing teams, overtaken for second place by Voorburg, who beat VRA Amsterdam in a hard-fought encounter at Westvliet, while Punjab Rotterdam took full advantage by beating Excelsior ’20 Schiedam and moving nine points clear at the top.

Sparta, who have suffered from a succession of poor starts this season, tried a new opening combination of Faisal Iqbal and Randeep Deol, and they put on 65 before Iqbal fell to Max O’Dowd for 47.

Deol soon followed, but missing Bobby Hanif and Pieter Seelaar from their attack VOC could make little impression against Tarr and Bukhari, and the total had reached 261 before Dirk van Baren, who had bowled impressively for no reward, bowled Bukhari for 96.

He had hit 12 fours and two sixes in his 87-ball innings and was unfortunate not to reach a deserved century, but Tarr soon posted his second of the season, departing soon afterwards for 103, made from 99 deliveries with eight fours and three sixes.

That took something out of the momentum of the innings, but the lower order managed to add another 41 before the closure. Van Baren took three for 57 and Pierce Fletcher three for 72.

VOC’s Dutch international openers Max O’Dowd and Scott Edwards were obviously key to their chances of a successful chase, and they made good initial progress against Bukhari and Max Hoornweg.

But with the total on 61 Edwards was removed by Usman Saleem, and with Van Baren and Tim de Kok going cheaply the burden fell increasingly on the shoulders of O’Dowd.

He and Arnav Jain added 54 for the fourth wicket, but the asking rate was becoming steadily steeper, and when O’Dowd was caught behind off Hoornweg for 74 any prospect of a VOC victory was extinguished.

Jain batted on with the tail and was left not out on 46 when the innings ended at 221, Saleem taking three for 43 and Manminder Singh cleaning up at the end for figures of four for 31.

Punjab Rotterdam looked as if they had taken control of their match against Excelsior ‘20 at the Zomercomplex when they dismissed the Schiedammers for 149, Lorenzo Ingram top-scoring with 38 and all seven Punjab bowlers claiming at least one wicket in another fine display in the field, but Excelsior made them work hard for the win.

Stephan Myburgh gave the chase characteristic momentum with a 30-ball blitz for 53, including eight fours and three sixes, but once he had gone the Excelsior attack imposed some order on proceedings, and when Klaas Roelfsema removed Saqib Zulfiqar 24 were still needed and Punjab had only four wickets standing.

Yasir Usman and Suleiman Tariq added 22 of them, however, and only two were required when Tom Heggelman returned to trap Usman leg-before. Irfan ul-Haq levelled the scores and then hit the winning boundary, giving the leaders a three-wicket victory with almost 22 overs to spare.

The contest between Voorburg and VRA Amsterdam was also a lot tighter than the bare result suggests, as Voorburg needed to bat into the 48th over before they overhauled VRA’s total of 178 and won by six wickets.

The Amsterdam side seemed to be on course for a big score as Luke Scully (50) and Eric Szwarczynski (55) took the tally to 120 for one, but the last nine wickets fell for just 58 runs as Voorburg fought back, Philippe Boissevain taking four for 38.

Ashir Abid grabbed two quick wickets when Voorburg replied, and with Quirijn Gunning bowling with plenty of fire it quickly became obvious that the home side would have to work hard for the win.

Sybrandt Engelbrecht and Aryan Dutt gradually turned the game their way with a fourth-wicket stand of 74, and after Dutt departed for 41, Engelbrecht and Karl Nieuwoudt completed the task, Engelbrecht ending on 59 not out and Nieuwoudt on 37.

HCC raced to another overwhelming victory, skittling Dosti Amsterdam for 63 at De Diepput and taking only 9.5 overs to complete an eight-wicket win.

Only Vinoo Tewarie (20) reached double figures for Dosti, while Olivier Klaus cleaned up for HCC with five for 13.

The early dismissal of Musa Ahmad and Boris Gorlee gave the Amsterdammers momentary hope, but Tonny Staal and Damian Crowley saw their side home, Staal finishing with an unbeaten 32 and Crowley with 17.

At Het Loopveld HBS Craeyenhout were also untroubled in beating ACC by 113 runs, mainly thanks to a third-wicket partnership of 130 between Tayo Walbrugh (73) and Navjit Singh (58), which enabled them to reach 198 for seven, and a sustained effort in the field which saw ACC limp to 85 all out in 49.1 overs.

Walbrugh’s knock took his tally for the season to 716 with a century and six fifties from his 10 innings, giving him a realistic chance of reaching the landmark of 1000 runs for the season.

Devanshu Arya took three for 25 for ACC, while Navjit and Stephan Vink did most of the damage for HBS, both finishing with three for 15. Julian de Mey and Ryan Klein set the tone, however, with two for 14 from ten overs and one for 7 from seven respectively.

Rod Lyall 28/06/21

After more overnight rain on Friday it was perhaps not surprising that the bowlers were in command in Saturday’s Topklasse matches, or that only one side passed 150, the highest total of the day Sparta 1888’s 187 all out against Excelsior ‘20 at Thurlede.

Led by Garnett Tarr’s 71 and a brisk 45 from Mamoon Latif that effort, however, proved to be in vain, as the rain returned with Excelsior on a precarious 39 for three after 11.2 overs in reply, and no further play was possible.

This was the more regrettable because the game was fascinatingly poised, with Tristan Stubbs batting with Joost Kroesen and Mudassar Bukhari and Max Hoornweg in full cry for Sparta, and perhaps in the end both sides could reasonably have regarded the single point for a No result as preferable to defeat.

The rain brought a premature end at the Hazelaarweg as well, but in this case Voorburg were on the brink of victory over VOC Rotterdam and took the points on the DLS calculation.

Even without three pace bowlers, Viv Kingma (still unable to bowl), Logan van Beek and Ali Ahmed Qasim, Voorburg’s attack was disciplined and incisive enough to bowl VOC out for 136, Bas de Leede removing Scott Edwards and Max O’Dowd in the opening exchanges, well supported by an accurate ten-over spell from Karl Nieuwoudt.

De Leede returned to clean up the innings and finish with four for 24, but not before Jelte Schoonheim had hit a run-a-ball 55 to rescue his side from a complete debacle, sharing useful partnerships with Arnav Jain and Ramdas Upadhyaya.

In a splendid allround performance the Voorburg captain then produced his best innings of the season, making an unbeaten 57 and with Mohit Hingorani (39 not out) putting on 105 for the second wicket, so that when the weather intervened the Villagers were on 120 for one in 29.1 overs.

The DLS par score at this point was 57, so Voorburg’s winning margin was 63 runs.

Leaders Punjab Rotterdam took full advantage of VOC’s defeat, securing a five-wicket victory over HBS at Craeyenhout and opening up a five-point lead over their nearest rivals.

So severe were the effects of the overnight rain there that the match did not start until 15:30, reduced from the outset to 28 overs a side, and another shower soon cut another four overs, by which time HBS had already lost danger-man Tobias Visée.

Punjab’s attack might have been designed for such a situation, and Suleiman Tariq and his fellow-bowlers expertly contained the home side to 121 for seven, 41 of them from Tayo Walbrugh and a cameo 26 from Wesley Barresi, in his first innings for eighteen months.

Also returning, Saqib Zulfiqar benefited from the batters’ efforts to raise the tempo in the closing stages, removing both Walbrugh and Barresi and finishing with four for 25.

HBS fought hard in the field, but 121 never really seemed likely to be enough, and with all four Zulfiqars and Teja Nidamanuru all chipping in and even Ryan Klein coming in for some heavy punishment, the leaders reached their target with nine deliveries to spare.

The match between VRA Amsterdam and HCC in the Amsterdamse Bos had already been over for an hour and a half when the sides got under way at Craeyenhout, a comedy of batting errors seeing 18 wickets fall for just 137 runs in 25.1 overs.

Hidde Overdijk (four for 20) and Reinier Bijloos (three for 31) were instrumental in skittling VRA for 68, opener Eric Szwarczynski the only man to reach double figures with 16.

HCC might conceivably mount the defence that they were trying to gain maximum benefit for their net run rate, but their smash-and-grab approach nearly backfired when they lost four wickets for just one run and found themselves still needing two to win with only two wickets standing.

Henrico Venter was equal to the challenge, however, and saw them the short distance home, although it was Boris Gorlee’s run-a-ball 26 which had brought them to the brink of victory.

Quirijn Gunning, back from injury, led VRA’s counter-attack with three for 24, while Vikram Singh claimed three for 9.

At Sportpark Drieburg on Sunday ACC beat bottom side Dosti-United by five wickets, the match enlivened by a sensational debut by teenager Zeeshan Master, who took five for 30 as the home side collapsed to 121 all out.

Rahil Ahmed had again given Dosti a decent start with 49, but once Master started to run through the lower order only 24 from Waheed Masood offered any real resistance.

Dosti’s bowlers, especially spinners Asief Hoseinbaks and Mahesh Hans, made ACC fight for every run, but Chris Knoll’s 60 saw them to within two runs of victory, and they completed the win with almost 13 overs to spare.

Rod Lyall 14/06/21

The intense competitiveness which is a hallmark of the Topklasse was fully in evidence almost everywhere on Saturday, the sole exception being at the Zomercomplex, where Punjab Rotterdam cruised to victory over ACC.

But the upshot of a dramatic day is that seven teams are in with a shot of a top-four spot as we reach the halfway mark – even seventh-placed HCC, if they can quickly reverse their losing streak of three on the trot.

Leaders Punjab Rotterdam were relatively untroubled in maintaining their position at the top of the table, dismissing ACC for 104 and needing less than 16 overs to knock off the runs for the loss of one wicket.

After a bright opening in which Sahil Kothari hit five fours in his 22 the ACC batters laboured mightily against a persistent Punjab attack, Shreyas Potdar and Aryan Kumar needing 16 and a half overs to add 39 for the fifth wicket, the mot productive partnership of the innings.

There were two wickets apiece for Sohail Bhatti, Mubashar Hussain, Teja Nidamanuru and Irfan ul Haq, with Asad Zulfiqar taking four catches behind the stumps in an all-round team performance.

Punjab soon lost Rehmat Zulfiqar when they replied, but with Stephan Myburgh clubbing 52 not out from 38 deliveries with 11 boundaries and Asad Zulfiqar contributing a slightly more circumspect 40 not out, the match was over almost before the second innings had started elsewhere.

A perfectly-judged knock by opener Max O’Dowd saw VOC Rotterdam to a three-wicket win over HCC at the Hazelaarweg, although the home side needed to survive a late collapse and bat into the final over to complete it.

They had apparently been cruising at 185 for two in pursuit of HCC’s total of 237 for eight, before Clayton Floyd struck back, ending a 137-run partnership between O’Dowd and Pieter Seelaar (82) and taking four more wickets to end with five for 35.

But O’Dowd stood firm as wickets tumbled at the other end, and the only disappointment was that he finished stranded on 97 not out.

It was all a lot closer than it had seemed likely to be in the first half-hour, when Pierce Fletcher was causing mayhem among the HCC top order, and the visitors were quickly reduced to 11 for four.

But Damian Crowley (82) and Hidde Overdijk (77) turned things round with a fifth-wicket stand of 168, and with Floyd contributing a rapid 39 they managed to set a reasonably challenging target.

If O’Dowd was unfortunate to miss out on his third century of the season, how much more so was Peter Borren, who ended on 99 not out as VRA Amsterdam posted 244 for five against Excelsior ‘20 in the Amsterdamse Bos?

He had come to the crease with his side on 66 for two, and after Eric Szwarczynski, having just passed fifty in the top flight for the 59th time, departed, Borren again found himself holding the innings together until he was joined by Mitch Lees with the score at 141 for five.

Captain and keeper then proceeded to add 103 in an unbroken sixth-wicket stand, of which Lees’s share was 31; in contrast to Borren’s century against HBS the previous week, this unbeaten 99 included just five fours.

Excelsior responded in kind, two partnerships of 88 between Roel Verhagen (44) and Lorenzo Ingram for the second wicket and then between Ingram and Tristan Stubbs taking the Schiedammers to 203 for two with seven overs remaining.

Then, however, Borren intervened to remove Stubbs for 39, and the complexion of this match too changed dramatically.

Two wickets fell in Leon Turmaine’s next over, and although Ingram had in the meantime reached his seventh Topklasse century, 34 were now needed from just five overs.

Then Ingram, too, went, caught off Luke Hartsink for 106, and although Rens van Troost kept fighting to the end, spinners Hartsink and Jack Balbirnie were able to restrict the scoring so effectively that Excelsior closed on 238 for seven, losing by just six runs.

Two remarkable batting collapses were the story of the match at Westvliet, where Voorburg and HBS Craeyenhout ended in a 31-run victory for the visitors.

After Ferdi Vink had won the toss and elected to bat, HBS were well placed at 144 for two, Tayo Walbrugh (82) and Navjit Singh (42) having put on 115 for the third wicket, but then Voorburg, who were missing both Viv Kingma (injured) and Logan van Beek (plying his trade with Derbyshire in the ECB’s Vitality Blast), fought back through Philippe Boissevain and Aryan Dutt, taking the last seven wickets for 39 runs.

Boissevain finished with three for 49 and Dutt with three for 27.

The HBS total of 183 seemed unlikely to be enough, especially when first Mohit Hingorani and Bas de Leede, and then Hingorani and Sybrandt Engelbrecht gave them a decent start, but once De Leede and Hingorani had both departed it was left to Engelbrecht to lead the chase.

But wickets kept falling at the other end, seamer Stephan Vink taking three for 29 and spinners Adil Ahmed, Navjit Singh and Julian de Mey all playing their part and when Engelbrecht, having made 68, was the last to go, the last five wickets had added a mere 24 and the total was only 152.

The bottom-of-the-table clash between Sparta 1888 and Dosti United Amsterdam at Sportpark Bermweg turned out to be another thriller, with Dosti producing their best batting effort of the season and falling just three runs short of Sparta’s total of 217.

Garnett Tarr (45) and Mudassar Bukhari (61) again provided the bulk of Sparta’s runs, although once they had gone it was Sawan Sardha, who made an unbeaten 33 and shared a stand of 29 for the final wicket with debutant Pradeep Kumar, who enabled them to get past 200 for the first time this year.

Sami Naseri was again the pick of the Dosti bowlers with four for 41.

Rahil Ahmed (44) and Mahesh Hans (27) got the Amsterdammers off to a good start with an opening stand of 75, but then Max Hoornweg ripped through the middle order, taking four wickets in twelve deliveries to reduce them to 80 for five.

They were rescued by Arief Hoseinbaks, whose career-best 51 saw them through to 165 for seven, and after his dismissal his brother Asief continued in partnership first with Waheed Masood and then with last man Nizar Sayed.

Hoornweg returned to remove Masood with 32 still needed, finishing with five for 37, but Hoseinbaks and Sayed edged the total towards the target until, inevitably perhaps, Bukhari trapped Sayed in front and Sparta had squeezed home.

Rod Lyall 07/06/21

It was a tight, low-scoring battle at De Diepput on Saturday, but in the end Punjab Rotterdam prevailed over HCC to edge to the top of the Topklasse table, a single point ahead of Rotterdam rivals VOC.

On a pitch that was never easy for the batters, two stood out: HCC’s Boris Gorlee, who made 68 out of his side’s total of 173, and Punjab’s Asad Zulfiqar, who, in the absence of internationals Stef Myburgh and Saqib Zulfiqar, steadied a faltering ship and saw his team through to a four-wicket victory.

HCC were also without international opener Musa Nadeem Ahmad, but the batting problems which have started to show after a storming start to the season are not solely due to his absence, and they were fully exploited by the Punjab attack, which makes up in guile what it lacks in pace.

Suleiman Tariq removed both openers and then Teja Nidamanuru spun out the middle order, including the wicket of Gorlee, before Tariq’s new-ball partner Sohail Bhatti returned to clean up the tail, although Yash Patel again provided valuable late-order resistance with 34 before he was last man out.

Nidamanuru and Bhatti ended with the same figures, three for 36.

Reinier Bijloos and Hidde Overdijk, a couple of yards faster than Punjab’s seamers, soon had the visitors’ batting under pressure, and with Rehmat and Sikander Zulfiqar and Nidamanuru all gone by the time 30 was on the board that total of 173 looked a lot better than it had half an hour earlier.

But Asad was rock solid at the other end, and in partnership first with Yasir Usman, and then with Tariq and Mudassar Hussain, he steadily worked his way towards the target.

When Hussain went 33 were still needed, and HCC threw everything into a push for the four remaining wickets.

In Irfan ul Haq, however, Asad found the ideal partner in such pressured circumstances, and it was his boundary which sealed the issue with more than four overs to spare.

At Thurlede, VOC Rotterdam were also without their international stars, and were no match for an Excelsior ‘20 attack which had the previous week dismissed HCC for 91.

The match was a personal landmark for Excelsior captain Tom Heggelman, who captured his 300th top flight wicket when he trapped Arnav Jain in front.

VOC’s main resistance came from Dirk van Baren, promoted to open in the absence of Max O’Dowd, and his 46 held the innings together until he was fifth out with the score on 70.

Ramdas Upadhyaya and captain-for the-day Pierce Fletcher managed to get the total into three figures, but with all seven Excelsior bowlers amongst the wickets the total of 102 was well short of what was needed.

Tim Etman chose this moment to hit his way into form, making 44 with four fours and a six, and although VOC took four wickets along the way Excelsior needed only 25.1 overs to complete their ix-wicket victory.

By contrast with these low-scoring encounters, the clash between HBS and VRA Amsterdam at Craeyenhout produced two outstanding centuries before the home side secured a 34-run win.

Tayo Walbrugh’s unbeaten 171, made from 139 deliveries with 16 fours and nine sixes, was a masterly display of hitting, as he treated VRA’s mostly young and inexperienced attack with controlled brutality.

He dominated stands of 93 with Navjit Singh for the third wicket, of 75 with Ryan Klein, and of 72 with Manjinder Singh, and HBS closed on 272 for five after young Ashir Abid had initially reduced them to 32 for two.

VRA then slumped to 51 for five in another top-order batting collapse, Ryan Klein again impressive with pace and accuracy.

But Peter Borren was still there, and when he was joined by Mitch Lees the pair set about reversing the course of the game; together they added 131 for the sixth wicket, and in the process Borren achieved the day’s other major landmark, scoring his 8000th top flight run for VRA when he passed 28.

Benno Boddendijk, who already had three wickets, returned to break the stand by removing Lees for 67, but Borren was not done yet, and although wickets continued to fall at the other end and the asking rate was approaching ten an over, he continued to take the fight to the HBS attack.

He and Abid added 55 for the ninth wicket of which Abid’s contribution was 6, and it was only when Borren, on 104, holed out at deep midwicket trying for another six off Boddendijk, that HBS could regard themselves as safe.

Boddendijk claimed the last to finish with six for 67, while Klein had four for 23.

At Het Loopveld, ACC’s total of 242 for seven against Sparta 1888 was due to contrasting knocks from Ammar Zaidi, whose not out 87 came from 118 deliveries and included just two fours, and Stephan Hannema, who came in with the innings effectively becalmed on 153 for six and smashed a 28-ball 50, including a four and four sixes.

Max Hoornweg had been instrumental in causing the home side early problems and after taking some punishment from Hannema finished with three for 42.

Sparta were in with a chance while Garnett Tarr (63) and Mudassar Bukhari (71) were putting together a fourth-wicket stand of 123, but once Anis Raza had removed them both the middle and lower order again struggled.

With Raza claiming three for 35 and Sahil Kothari three for 33 the innings petered out, and closed on 193 for nine, giving ACC a 49-run victory.

Voorburg, without four internationals, made short work of Dosti United at Sportpark Drieburg on Sunday, bowling them out for just 64 and knocking off the runs in 14.5 overs to win by nine wickets.

Karl Nieuwoudt, given the new ball in the absence of Viv Kingma and Logan van Beek, celebrated by claiming three wickets in his first three overs, and Dosti never recovered from this onslaught.

Satish Ravichandran was the only man to reach double figures, his 22 contributing a third of his side’s runs, while Nieuwoudt finished with four for 22 and Ali Ahmed Qasim three for 13.

Aryan Dutt made sure of the points with a rapid 38 not out, hitting seven fours and a six, as Voorburg moved level with VOC on points and into second place on net run rate.

The rain was gone at last, and with the sun on their backs the batters mostly celebrated on Saturday, with three centuries posted and the totals of the sides batting first generally well over 200.

The main exception was at Thurlede, where HCC, after winning the toss, were bundled out for 91 by a rampant Excelsior ‘20 and lost by 6 wickets, their first defeat of the season.

It would have been even worse but for some late-order resistance from Dietmar Hennop and Olivier Klaus, the only men apart from opener Daniël Trijzelaar to achieve double figures, for at one stage the Hagenaars were on 59 for seven.

Chief destroyer was spinner Umar Baker, whose ten-over spell yielded four wickets at a cost of 20 runs, while seamer Rens van Troost tied up the other end with two for 13.

The home side’s top order did not find conditions any more to their liking when they replied, however, and with Clayton Floyd and Reinier Bijloos collecting two wickets apiece they soon found themselves on 10 for four.

HCC saw their chance of an improbable victory, but it was steadily taken away from them by Tristan Stubbs and Sanjit Shankar who, cautiously at first but with increasing momentum, knocked off the remaining runs, Stubbs finishing it with successive sixes to end on 44 not out. Shankar made an unbeaten 35.

The highest total of the day came in Amstelveen, where hosts VRA Amsterdam posted 302 for six and beat winless Dosti United Amsterdam by 133 runs.

Foundation of VRA’s big score was a second-wicket stand of 143 between Vikram Singh (103) and Shirase Rasool (73), with Peter Borren and Eric Szwarczynski both chipping in before Mitch Lees made a 21-ball 32 not out in the closing stages.

Leg-spinner Vinoo Tewarie, who broke the big partnership by trapping Rasool in front, was the most successful of Dosti’s bowlers with two for 39 from nine overs.

The Dosti top order, reinforced by the return of Rahil Ahmed, showed signs of improvement, reaching 102 for two before Udit Nashier with three for 18, supported by Borren’s experience, caused a rapid decline, and the last eight wickets fell for 63 runs.

It seemed for a time that Punjab Rotterdam’s total against Sparta 1888 at the Bermweg would dwarf even VRA’s, as Rehmat Zulfiqar (80) and Stef Myburgh (63) put on a rapid opening stand of 147.

But the home side managed to put on the brakes, and with Nasrat Ibrahimkhil taking three for 36 and Max Hoornweg and Joost Martijn Snoep claiming two apiece, Punjab had to be content with a total of 285 for nine.

But that proved to be plenty, as apart from thirties from Ali Raza and the dependable Mudassar Bukhari Sparta’s batting again crumbled, and they were all out for 106 in under 35 overs.

The wickets were shared, with Suleiman Tariq, Sikander Zulfiqar, Mubashar Hussain and Teja Nidamanuru all picking up a couple.

The pattern was reversed at Westvliet, where Voorburg were in early trouble at 42 for three against a determined ACC, before they were rescued by a superb fourth-wicket stand of 194 between Sybrandt Engelbrecht and Aryan Dutt.

Engelbrecht’s unbeaten 129, made from 125 deliveries with ten fours, was the highest individual core of the day, and he was well supported by Dutt, who made 77 before he was run out by ACC skipper Anis Raza.

Raza had tried eight bowlers in his quest for a breakthrough, but only Sahil Kothari and Mees van Vliet with the new ball had been able to cause the batters serious problems.

Opener Kothari also anchored the ACC reply, his steadying 51 the only effort able to withstand the Voorburg attack, but once he was the seventh man out with the total on 100 the end came quickly.

Viv Kingma cleaned up the tail to finish with four for 20 as ACC, reduced to ten men by the absence of Devanshu Arya, were all out for 105 and lost by 139 runs.

The day’s closest match was at the Hazelaarweg, where HBS Craeyenhout tested leaders VOC Rotterdam more severely than might be suggested by the latter’s eventual 76-run margin.

They owed their total of 225 for seven to captain Pieter Seelaar, whose 108 not out enabled them to recover from a perilous 88 for five and was his first century for the club.

He was ably assisted by Ayaaz Durrani, who contributed 41 before being run out, while there were two wickets apiece for Ryan Klein, Julian de Mey and Navjit Singh.

HBS offered a spirited response, but only Navjit Singh (53) was able to build on a promising start, and by the time he was eighth out with the total on 129 any chance of a successful chase was long past

Young leg-spinner Siebe van Wingerden again caused the batters plenty of problems, and he was the most successful of VOC’s bowlers with three for 30.

At Sportpark Drieberg on Sunday HBS had the better of their postponed fourth-round match, beating a steadily-improving Dosti United by 39 runs.

HBS appeared to be heading for a sizable total while Tayo Walbrugh was sharing a third-wicket stand of 69 with Navjit Singh and going on to make 72, but once Tewarie had trapped him LBW the innings lost some momentum, and it took useful late contributions from Julian de Mey and Adil Ahmed to get the total up to 215.

Tewarie claimed four for 48 for Dosti, while Asief Hoseinbaks bowled economically without being rewarded with a wicket.

Rahil Ahmed led the Dosti reply, and when he and Mahesh Hans were adding 68 for the fourth wicket it seemed that their first win for nearly two years was a real possibility.

Once he was run out for 78, however, the chance dissipated, and the side was dismissed for 176, Ryan Klein taking four for 21 for HBS.

Rod Lyall 26/05/21

On another day on which it seemed that the action might be confined to the weather radar, it was remarkable not only that four Topklasse matches were played to completion on Monday, but also that there were some outstanding individual performances, several of them with the bat.

Pride of place must go to VOC’s Max O’Dowd, whose 131 from 85 deliveries (or possibly 133 from 82), including seven fours and eleven sixes, combined considerable skill with brutal aggression as he took his side’s total against Dosti United to 177 for six.

In an innings twice interrupted by rain, seeing the available overs cut from 36 at the start to 23, O’Dowd completely dominated the Dosti attack in the latter stages: after taking 46 deliveries to reach fifty he needed only another 25 to go to his century, and then a further 11 before he hit a return catch to Vinoo Tewarie.

Dosti had kept the scoring within bounds for the first eight overs or so, Waheed Masood bowling well both then and later to finish with two for 22, while Tewarie, whose first over of leg spin had gone for 22, was rewarded with three wickets in his second and last at a final cost of 31.

Chasing an adjusted target of 185, Dosti had no answer to VOC’s spin attack of Arnav Jain (who had earlier played second fiddle to O’Dowd in an opening stand of 103) and Siebe van Wingerden, and were speedily reduced to 26 for seven.

Van Wingerden’s five overs yielded four for 8 and Jain’s three for 13, and then Pieter Seelaar and Rohan Malik finished things off, Malik taking two wickets in his first over before a run out ended proceedings with the total on 44, Asief Hoseinbaks the only man to reach double figures and sharing a last-wicket stand of 12 with Jatin Kumar, the best of the innings.

At the Zomercomplex co-leaders Voorburg’s challenge wilted in the face of another remarkable onslaught, as Teja Nidamanuru belted a 39-ball 80 not out, including five fours and eight sixes, to rescue Punjab from a perilous 30 for three as they chased a modest total of 126 for nine in 30 overs.

Put in in damp conditions, Voorburg laboured throughout their innings, scoring slowly early on against a disciplined Punjab attack and then losing wickets as they battled to set a reasonable target.

Logan van Beek hit a brisk 25 and Philippe Boissevain top-scored with 28, while Saqib Zulfiqar collected three for 27.
Viv Kingma and Ali Ahmed Qasim grabbed three quick wickets when Punjab replied, but then Nidamanuru took over, supported by Rehmat Zulfiqar, and despite a break for rain the Rotterdammers stormed to their seven-wicket victory in 16.2 overs.

Another whirlwind innings, this time from HCC’s Musa Nadeem Ahmed, enabled his side to secure the points in controversial circumstances against Sparta 1888 on De Diepput’s second ground.

Sparta had reached 11 for two in six overs when a prolonged delay for rain cut the game to 29 overs, and another poor batting display saw them dismissed for 116, a total which might have been a good deal lower but for a defiant 27 from Prithvi Balwantsingh.

A DLS adjustment set HCC 113 to win, and with more rain on the horizon they began at a gallop, Tonny Staal smacking 22 from 10 deliveries and Boris Gorlee 12 from six, while Ahmad’s 15-ball 40 not out saw them reach 88 for two in just 5.5 overs.

Then the rain returned, with HCC still 25 short of their target, but once play could be resumed with the match cut to 20 overs the new DLS calculation showed that the home side had already reached the revised target and they were declared the winners. With a par core of 25 at 5.5 overs the margin was an improbable 63 runs.

At Het Loopveld ACC staged a remarkable comeback against neighbours VRA in a tense Amsterdam derby, but the visitors just hung on to achieve a last-over, three-wicket victory.

ACC’s innings was a stuttering affair, not helped by an interruption for rain when they had reached 56 for three, and with their overs reduced to 31 they battled their way to 118 for seven, with Leon Turmaine taking two catches and producing two run-outs to go with his one for 22 in seven overs.

Chasing a revised target of 129, VRA seemed to be one course for an easy win while opener Ben Cooper was belting a 35-ball 64 which included four fours and three sixes, but once he had gone Sahil Kothari, Davanshu Arya and Aryan Kumar ran through the middle order, five wickets falling for 14 runs.

Jack Balbirnie made 22 before he was seventh out with 21 still needed, and it took a determined stand between Mitch Lees and Ashir Abid to see their side home with four balls to spare.

The only match not to get a finish was at Craeyenhout, where HBS posted 165 for nine in 25 overs against Excelsior ‘20, only to see the game abandoned because there was insufficient time remaining for the visitors to face the minimum 20 overs.

The HBS total was built on a 20-ball 33 from Tobias Visée and a 25-ball 44 from Tayo Walbrugh, with Navjit Singh and Julian de Mey chipping in with 30 and 26 respectively.

Gijs Kroesen was Excelsior’s most successful bowler cashing in with three for 7 as the HBS batters tried to squeeze every last run from the closing overs.

It was all in vain, however, as here at least the weather had the last word.

Rod Lyall 23/05/21

Only two Topklasse matches survived the band of rain which swept across the country on Friday night and Saturday morning, but they offered plenty of excitement, the encounter between HBS Craeyenhout and HCC going down to the final ball and ending in a tie.

It had been a see-saw affair throughout the closing stages, with returning rain threatening to take the players from the field and the Duckworth Lewis Stern balance shifting almost literally from delivery to delivery, certainly from over to over.

Put in to bat in a game reduced to 31 overs a side, HBS had made a solid 183 for five, led off by a 19-ball 29 from Tobias Visée and given substance by a third-wicket stand of 87 between Tayo Walbrugh (59) and Navjit Singh (44).

Ollie Klaus was the pick of the HCC attack, his six overs yielding just 27 runs and the wicket of opener Reece Mason, who made 25.

The HCC reply could scarcely have got off to a worse start, skipper Tonny Staal run out without facing a ball, but then Musa Nadeem Ahmad and Boris Gorlee put on 68 for the second wicket, and after Gorlee had been trapped in front by Ryan Klein for 42 Ahmad and Damian Crowley added another 68 for the third.

HCC’s scoring rate remained below the DLS par score for much of this period, but a couple of costly overs from the least experienced of the HBS bowlers finally put the Lions ahead in the 23rd over and kept them there, despite the loss of Crowley, bowled by Ferdi Vink when he had made 34 and then of Musa Ahmad, smartly caught by Visée off Stephan Vink for 68.

Some spirited hitting by Hidde Overdijk kept HCC’s noses in front as the umpires kept the players out in the middle despite the rain, but even so seven runs were still needed as Ryan Klein began the final over.

Bowling off a shortened run in the slippery conditions, Klein kept the scoring to a leg-bye and a single from the first three deliveries, and then had Clayton Floyd caught by Julian van der Raad on the long on boundary as he attempted what would have been the winning hit.

Overdijk was now back on strike, and after another dot ball he was able to conjure a boundary off the last to level the scores.

Only the most passionately partisan observer would deny that a tie was a fair result in a game between two skilled and determined sides, and much more satisfying than a premature conclusion in which the weather played a part in settling the winner.

There was plenty of determination on display, too, at Westvliet, where Voorburg moved level with VOC Rotterdam at the top of the table with a win which was a good deal more hard-fought than might have been suggested by Sparta 1888’s results so far.

Sparta’s total of 160 was dominated by a third-wicket partnership of 76 between Garnett Tarr, who posted a maiden Topklasse half-century with 52, and Mudassar Bukhari (59 from 45 deliveries, with five fours and two sixes).

Once Bukhari had gone, however, another batting collapse ensued, the last six wickets – three of them run-outs – falling for the addition of just 18 runs.

The Voorburg attack lacked some of its accustomed punch through the absence of Viv Kingma, but Logan van Beek, Ali Ahmed Qasim and Stef Mulder collected five wickets between them.

Voorburg appeared to be cruising when Mohit Hingorani (51) and Tom de Grooth (59) put on 107 for the first wicket, but once Hingorani was brilliantly caught by Ali Raza off Manminder Singh Sparta fought their way back into the game.

Bas de Leede, Sybrandt Engelbrecht and Aryan Dutt came and went in quick succession, and when De Grooth, too, departed, the victim of an outstanding one-handed catch by Bukhari at midwicket, five wickets had fallen for 27 runs.

But few Topklasse sides enjoy the luxury of a batter of Van Beek’s quality coming in at No. 6, and his 24 not out ensured that Voorburg reached their target with more than three overs to spare.