Holland claimed the final qualifying place at the 2007 World Cup
Cricinfo staff11-Jul-2005Holland claimed the final qualifying place at the 2007 World Cup, and with it $500,000 of funding and ODI status, by beating United Arab Emirates by 145 runs in the ICC Trophy fifth-place play-off at Clontarf. They join the four teams who have already qualified from the event – Bermuda, Canada, Ireland and Scotland.Having narrowly missed out on automatic qualification during the group stage, Holland bounced back with two emphatic victories to seal the final place in the Caribbean. They beat Denmark by 89 runs on Saturday to reach today’s play-off and proved far too strong for UAE under a cloudless sky to claim a victory that will see them compete in a second consecutive World Cup and third in total.The key to Holland’s victory was the composure under pressure of their batsmen. After being put in to bat, the swinging white ball made the opening overs a struggle for the top order. Luuk van Troost and Dan van Bunge were both back in the pavilion with only 15 runs on the board.But Bas Zuiderent, Holland’s outstanding batsman of the tournament, took responsibility for anchoring the innings. In tandem with Tim de Leede, he set about steering the Dutch into the ascendancy. By the time that de Leede was out for 65 Holland had a solid platform so in the final overs Zuiderent and Ryan ten Doeschate were able to play without inhibition to push the score to 287 for four in 50 overs.Ten Doeschate finished on 65 not out while Zuiderent was unbeaten on 116. It was Zuiderent’s third century for his country, all of which have come in this tournamentUAE chased a bigger total than this to beat Holland in the ICC Six Nations Challenge, on home soil in 2004, but never came close to emulating that feat today. They took an attacking approach from the start, which kept them in touch with the run-rate, but at the expense of valuable wickets as too many players took chances against the disciplined Dutch pace attack.Five different bowlers picked up wickets as Holland rattled through the UAE batting line-up. The game was wrapped up when Ali Asad Abbas was clean bowled by Billy Stelling with the third ball of the 32nd over to leave UAE all out for 142.Canada v BermudaCanada claimed third place with a comfortable five-wicket victory over Bermuda. Though both countries had already qualified for the World Cup, victory in the third/fourth play-off puts Canada into a group with England, New Zealand and Kenya for 2007 while Bermuda faces the prospect of India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.Bermuda elected to bat after winning the toss at Malahide but found the going tough against a Canada side determined to demonstrate regional superiority. After losing two wickets for three runs at the start of the innings a series of batsmen failed to capitalise on solid starts. Irving Romaine was alone in making an impression but without significant support his 71 runs were only enough to lift Bermuda to 195 all out in 48.5 overs.Canada has the most explosive top order in the tournament with captain John Davison charged with leading the line. The early dismissal of Davison for 5 had little impact as Desmond Chumney and Zubin Surkari put on 95 for the second wicket. Both men fell just short of their half-centuries but, with wickets and overs in hand, Canada completed the victory for the loss of three further wickets with nine overs to spare.Playoffs for 7 – 12Namibia ended the tournament on a high with an emphatic 103-run victory over Denmark to finish in seventh place. But the most thrilling cricket of the day came in the matches that decided the rankings of the sides from ninth to twelfth.The final positions of teams in this tournament will have qualification implications for future events and Oman captured the crucial ninth place with a spectacular victory over USA.USA’s medium-paced bowling attack has struggled to contain sides in this event but they must have felt confident of defending a total of 345 for 6 against Oman. It seemed to be going America’s way when Oman were reduced to 82 for 4 and then 211 for 7 but an astonishing eighth-wicket partnership turned the match on its head.Azhar Syed contributed an essential 44 runs but the match-winner was Farhan Khan who smashed 94 not out from 47 balls in an innings which included four fours and an incredible nine sixes as Oman won by two wickets with five balls to spare.Khan’s heroics overshadowed a tense climax in the final play-off between Papua New Guinea and Uganda. After labouring to 203 all out from 49.5 overs, PNG managed to restrict Uganda to 202 for 9 in their allotted 50 overs to claim eleventh place by a single run. Uganda’s batsmen have struggled to come to terms with the Irish conditions but their bowling and fielding indicate great promise for the future.
