Van der Gugten, Seelaar snuff out Canada's challenge

Netherlands bettered their chances of direct entry into the 2015 World Cup with a thumping nine-wicket win over Canada in the second WCL match between the two teams. The first game on Tuesday was abandoned due to heavy rain.

Netherlands bowlers' particularly pacer Timm van der Gugten and left-arm spinner Pieter Seelaar, fashioned the win with some attacking bowling after their side chose to field first.

Gugten, who opened the bowling had immediate success, as the ball sneaked between bat and pad to bowl Hiral Patel off the second ball of the match. Two balls later, he had another wicket, as Nitish Kumar edged the ball to wicketkeeper Wesley Barressi.

Four overs later, Gugten produced another double-wicket over, dismissing the in-form opener Ruvindu Gunasekera and Raza-ur-Rehman in the space of three balls. Mudassar Bukhari followed that up in the next over with the wicket of Jimmy Hansra. Canada's captain, Ashish Bagai was out in the next over for 3 off 16 balls, van der Gugten's first four overs had yielded 5 for 9 and Canada were in complete disarray at 10 for 6.

A stubborn 34-run stand for the seventh-wicket, led by Damodar Daesrath brought brief respite to the batting side's miseries. But it was the introduction of left-arm spinner Pieter Seelaar that snuffed out any hopes that Canada may have had of a recovery. Brought into the attack in the17th over, Seealaar started off with a maiden, but struck in the next over, dismissing Junaid Siddiqui and Kenneth Kamyuka. Daesrath tried to play a few attacking shots in order to add as many runs to Canada's total but was eventually out for a stoic 55-ball 31, as the side folded for only 67.

Opener Stephan Myburgh then smashed an unbeaten 52 off 33 balls as Netherlands crossed the target in a little over 10 overs for the loss of only one wicket. Myburgh's innings included six fours and two sixes, including one off a sweep shot that brought up the winning runs.

Netherlands have been playing under protest after the chairman of the Royal Dutch Cricket Association Jacques Mulder signed a complaint over the condition of the field at King City. Rain postponed their match against Canada on Tuesday, but further inclement weather forced it to be called off, depriving Netherlands of the opportunity to qualify directly to the World Cup 2015. "The field is insufficiently prepared for international cricket. On a good field we could have begun [the game] much earlier after the rain." Mulder said. "The Canadian Board has not acted according to regulations. We are being fooled."

Netherlands must now await the results of the matches between Scotland and Ireland in September and Afghanistan and Kenya in October. If Netherlands fail to progress directly, they will have to compete in a qualifying tournament in January for another shot at participating in the World Cup.