Netherlands chase down 159 for second straight win

A day after clinching a four-run win against Test nation Ireland, Netherlands went on to chase 159 with an over to spare against the same opponents in the second match of the tri-series in Rotterdam. The four-wicket win was led by their openers before Roelof van der Merwe scored 37 off 26 and then captain Pieter Seelaar saw them through with an unbeaten 22. Van der Merwe had also taken two wickets earlier as Ireland scored 158 for 6 with an unbeaten 42-ball 45 from Gary Wilson.

Netherlands never let the required run rate out of control once Tobias Visee started the chase with a 15-ball 25 and his opening partner Max O'Dowd scored a brisk 39 off 24. George Dockrell broke the stand when he bowled Visee in the fourth over and Nos. 3 and 4 Ben Cooper and Bas de Leede got out cheaply. Between those two wickets, O'Dowd was caught behind off Stuart Thompson and Netherlands were 97 for 4 in the 12th over.

However, van der Merwe and Seelaar stitched a stand of 39 runs in 32 balls, as van der Merwe struck three fours and a six. Even though he was bowled by Barry McCarthy in the 17th over, Netherlands needed another 23 runs from 20 balls and Seelaar's unbeaten knock took them home.

Earlier, Ireland opted to bat and their openers Paul Stirling (27 off 16) and James Shannon (31 off 21) gave them a flying start. They put on 58 runs by the fifth over but were both bowled within a space of nine balls and it reduced Ireland's run rate thereafter. The middle order could not capitalise on the platform, as left-arm medium-pacer Fred Klaassen and van der Merwe strangled the scoring rate. William Porterfield and Wilson could not score at a strike rate of over 110 in the 62 combined balls they faced together to score a total of 65 runs and even though Kevin O'Brien struck 13 runs off six balls, 158 did not prove to be enough.