India breeze past Netherlands by ten wickets

After their 81-run loss at the hands of hosts England, India were quickly back to their winning ways in the Costcutter under-15 World Challenge on Monday. Although the Netherlands Under-15 side hardly posed a serious threat, the manner in which India coasted to their ten wicket victory would have restored Roger Binny's confidence in his players.

Winning the toss, Indian captain Subhash Dixit had no hesitation in electing to put his opposition in. Although the Indian senior side has a reputation for being very bad at chasing, India's age group sides have displayed no such difficulty. It must be remembered that both the victorious Under-19 side in Sri Lanka and the Indian Under-15 side that lifted the Asian Cricket Council (ACC) Under-15 Tournament in Malaysia won more matches chasing than batting first.

A strong bowling attack led by the big, strong left arm medium pacer Irfan Pathan knifed through the inexperienced Netherlands side. Opener W Diepeveen was the first to go, caught behind by stumper Abhinav Kumar off Pathan. A Woutersen was trapped leg before off the very first ball he faced and Netherlands were off to a bad start at 9/2. Wickets then fell at regular intervals, with Netherlands skipper H Seelar holding up one end. Although he managed to face 100 balls, his innings yielded just 32, which ended up being the top score for Netherlands. The leg breaks that Rajesh Banik sent down accounted for the next two wickets in the middle order, reducing Netherlands to 34/4.

F Trijzelaar, batting at number 7, brought some respectability to the Netherlands total in an innings of 21 that included three boundaries. He was well backed up by wicketkeeper P Bekker who made a breezy 18. Apart from these three, none of the other batsmen made it to double figures. For India, the wickets were spread evenly around, with captain Subhash Dixit returning the best figures (2/16 off his 10 overs).

The final target for India was a modest 111. Even Nelson could not stop the Indians as openers Swapnej Thakur and Abhinav Kumar knocked off the required runs. Thakur (56*) helped himself to a half century while Abhinav Kumar was unbeaten on 30. The 25 extras that the Netherlands team sent down made India's easy task even easier.