World Cup Days 13/14: Netherlands shock South Africa and New Zealand go four from four

Following Afghanistan's win against England on Sunday, the ICC Men's Cricket World Cup sparked into life with the reigning champions losing two of their first three matches. Two days later it was the Netherlands's turn to spring a surprise with, what turned out to be, a comfortable win against South Africa by 38 runs.

After a delayed start caused by rain and resulting in the match being shortened to 43 overs per side, South Africa looked to be on top in the early exchanges and had the Netherlands 112/6 in the 27th over. It was at this point that mistakes crept into the South African bowling and fielding efforts. The Netherlands were able to get back into the match courtesy of an unbeaten 78 from captain Scott Edwards and a 19-ball 29 from Roelof van der Merwe.

The latter was heavily involved with the ball and set the tempo for the Dutch when he clean-bowled Temba Bavuma with his first ball. He followed it up with the wicket of Rassie van der Dussen to leave South Africa 44/4 in the 12th over and in some trouble having lost a couple of their most in-form players.

South Africa's target was 246, a target which in most circumstances would be fairly straightforward for a batting line-up of their prowess. However, South Africa continued to lose regular wickets and the highest partnership was a run-a-ball 45 between Heinrich Klaasen and David Miller.

It became clear that South Africa were not going to chase the target so focus turned to trying to bat out the remaining overs of the innings. This they did until Keshav Maharaj was caught behind off the penultimate ball of the innings.

This historic win for the Netherlands follows up their win against the same opponents in the 2022 T20 World Cup. On that occasion, the margin of victory was just 13 runs.

Afghanistan were not able to back up their victory against England when they came up against New Zealand in the fourth round of matches. Confusion was caused when they opted to bowl first on a pitch that looked ideal for batting. They were also poor in the field and did not take many of the chances that were presented to them.

Once again, Rashid Khan bowled well and claimed figures of 1-43 from his ten overs. It was not all plain sailing for the New Zealand batters and a partnership of 144 between Tom Latham and Glenn Phillips was achieved in 153 balls. The platform that they built enabled Mark Chapman to make 25 at a strike rate of over 200 at the end of the innings as the Blackcaps took their total up to 288/6.

Afghanistan were never in the chase and the early wickets of openers Rahmanullah Gurbaz and Ibrahim Zadran, before the end of the powerplay, seemed to only confirm that the inevitable was going to happen.

The Blackcaps kept up the pressure and whittled away at the Afghanistan batting order. Mitchell Santner with his subtle variations of line and pace claimed the key wicket of Mohammad Nabi; and Lockie Ferguson, bowling with pace and bounce, claimed the wickets of the other two members of the spin trio, Rashid Khan and Mujeeb Ur Rahman. The pair claimed three wickets apiece.

New Zealand registered a comprehensive 149-run win as their excellent start to the tournament continued. In theory, they now only need to win two more matches to qualify for the last four. Their next opponents will be India in Dharamshala on Sunday. Meanwhile, Afghanistan will next play Pakistan in Chennai on Monday of next week