Ackermann, van der Merwe return for Netherlands' T20 World Cup campaign

Roelof van der Merwe, Colin Ackermann, Timm van der Gugten, Fred Klaassen, Paul van Meekeren and Brandon Glover are all part of Netherlands' 16-man squad for the men's T20 World Cup, to be played in Australia in October-November.

The six of them, among the country's most well-travelled cricketers, were not in the 14-man squad that played Netherlands' last T20I series, at home against New Zealand early last month. From that squad, Aryan Dutt, Clayton Floyd, Vivian Kingma and Ryan Klein have been omitted. The squad has experienced hands in Logan van Beek, Tom Cooper, Bas de Leede, Stephan Myburgh, Max O'Dowd, and will be led by wicketkeeper-batter Scott Edwards.

"We have assembled a well-balanced squad with an exciting blend of youth and experience for the upcoming T20 World Cup," Ryan Cook, the head coach, said in a statement. "The experience playing in the Super League [for qualification to the ODI World Cup] will stand the team in good stead and good confidence can be taken from these performances.

"We will look to continue the progression that was evident through the summer into the tournament and have some quality preparation planned prior to the event which will help the readiness for the group in both skills and cohesion."

Netherlands qualified for the T20 World Cup - alongside Zimbabwe - after the T20 World Cup qualifier, played in Zimbabwe in July. They were most recently in action in the ODI World Cup Super League, which Cook mentioned, against Pakistan, at home in Rotterdam, but lost the three-match series 3-0.

Van der Merwe was most recently in action for Northern Superchargers in the men's Hundred in England, but last played internationally all the way back in November 2021, in an ODI series on the tour of South Africa. His last T20I was in October 2021 during the last T20 World Cup in the UAE, where Netherlands lost all their first-round matches - to Sri Lanka, Namibia and Ireland - to exit the tournament early.

Ackermann has also not played a T20I since that World Cup, though he did play ODI cricket for Netherlands as recently as in the series against Afghanistan in Qatar in January this year.

While Klaassen, van Meekeren and Glover were all in action at the World Cup qualifiers in Zimbabwe, van der Gugten missed that tournament. He has, however, been in action for Glamorgan in the county circuit, and also played one match for Birmingham Phoenix in the men's Hundred.

In the opening round of the T20 World Cup, Netherlands will take on Namibia, Sri Lanka and UAE in Geelong.