Chronicle Editor
Brandon Moyo, Sports Reporter
THREE weeks of exhilarating cricket are coming to an end at Harare Sports Club today as Sri Lanka and the Netherlands go up against each other in the final of the 2023 Men’s Cricket World Cup Qualifiers.
The two teams have booked their places at the 2023 Men’s Cricket World Cup finals in India in October and today the curtain will come down on the qualifiers. From 10 teams, we are down to the final two and today’s game will determine who goes to India as Qualifier 1 and Qualifier 2. The winner of the final will go in as Qualifier 1 while the runners-up will occupy the slot of Qualifier 2.
A tough task lies ahead for the Dutch as the Sri Lankan team has been playing a good brand of cricket and saying that they came to Zimbabwe to win all their matches. However, Netherlands skipper Scott Edwards said their aim is to win the tournament.
Netherlands players have had a stellar tournament so far and will be looking at ending it on a high note. The Netherlands’ batting order which comprises players such as Max O’Dowd, Vikramjit Singh, Bas de Leede, Logan Van Beek has had a good run and skipper Edwards said he is excited to have such a batting order.
He added that going into today’s final the pressure is a little bit less on them considering that they have already achieved their goal which was to qualify.
“First we have an amazing bunch of guys. Everyone gets along well, sometimes these long tours can be tough but everyone blends in together all with the same goal in mind and I’m equally as proud of the guys that haven’t played a game and the guys that had match-winning performances and things like that.
“Roll the boat is our method and we still have got one more game to roll through and at the moment the boat is rolling pretty nicely. The pressure is a lot less, we have already qualified but our goal coming here was to win the tournament and we have put out our best performance, the guys will obviously celebrate and then we will get back in the boat for the game,” said Edwards.
Netherlands are going into the final after beating Scotland by four wickets at Queens Sports Club on Thursday.
After they won the toss and elected to field first, they restricted their opponents to 277/9 in 50 overs and had to chase down the target in 44 overs or less to progress, something which they managed to do, finishing on 278/6 in 42,5 overs. De Leede was named player of the match after taking a fifer and scoring a hundred.
The final will be a repeat of a match that was played last Friday at the same venue which Sri Lanka went on to win by 21 runs. After that victory, the Lankans went on to thump Zimbabwe by nine wickets to get an unassailable eight points in the Super Six, effectively booking their spot in the final.
The grand finale is set to start at 9am and tickets for the match will be available at the gates at Harare Sports Club.
@brandon_malvin
Online Reporter