Namibia shock Netherlands on back of Wiese half-century

After being bowled out for their joint-lowest T20 total – 96 – batting first on Monday, Namibia came back with a fine batting display to keep their qualification hopes alive with a crushing win over Netherlands in their second qualifying match played at the Sheikh Zayed Cricket Stadium in Abu Dhabi yesterday.

The architects of their win were former South African international David Wiese and skipper Gerhard Erasmus who shared a 98-run stand for the fourth wicket to put Netherlands almost out of contention for a Super 12 berth.

Netherlands will meet Sri Lanka on Friday at the Sharjah Cricket ground in their last group game, at least hoping for a consolation victory. The win put Namibia in contention for one of the two spots from Group A into the Super 12.

Wiese, who has been plying his trade in franchise cricket around the world, was at his brutal best taking the bowlers to the sword, reaching his half century with a massive six over the cover boundary. His 50, a match winning one, came off just 29 deliveries and he was unbeaten on 66 off 40 balls as he ruthlessly punished the Netherlands attack. JJ Smit was unbeaten on 14, hitting two back to back boundaries in the penultimate over of the match to steer them for victory.

Earlier, Netherlands, put into bat first, reached a formidable 164 for the loss of four wickets on the back of a fine half century by Max O’dowd. O’dowd who batted till the last over of their innings despite the scorching heat in the city made 70 off 56 balls and shared 82 runs for the third wicket between Colin Ackermann.

Along the way O’dowd scored his second consecutive half century in the tournament, a well compiled one. He was ably supported by Ackermann who hit 35 off 32 before Jan Frylinck had him caught at deep midwicket to finish with figures of 2 for 36 in his 4 over spell. Scott Edwards who joined O’dowd smashed a quick-fire 21 off 11 at the death to push the score over 160 run mark.

Namibia made one change to their line-up from the team that was heavily defeated by Sri Lanka replacing offspinner Pikky Ya France with left-arm seamer Michael van Lingen.

Netherlands also made one change to their attack bringing in Timm van der Gugten for Brandon and batter Stephan Myburgh for Ben Cooper at the top of the order.