Rotterdam Fixed the Batting and Lost by Eight Wickets — an Unbroken 113 From de Leede and Tim David Ended It With Fourteen Balls Left

On Saturday evening at Sportpark Westvliet, Rotterdam Dockers were nine for four inside three overs and were bowled out for 93. The line everybody reached for afterwards — this one included — was that the deepest batting order in the ETPL had finally been asked a question and had no answer.

On Sunday evening, on the same square, they made 176 for 6. Faf du Plessis batted 47 balls for 60. Heinrich Klaasen, who had faced a single delivery the night before, made 29 from 19. David Wiese came in at 121 for 5 in the seventeenth and hit four sixes in sixteen balls for 43 not out. It was Rotterdam's biggest score of the tournament and it was, by the standards of the ground, an above-par total.

Amsterdam Flames knocked it off in 17.4 overs for the loss of two wickets. Bas de Leede and Tim David came together at 65 for 2 in the seventh over and were still there at the end, 113 runs later. Neither of them was dismissed. Neither of them ever looked like being dismissed.

Fifty-five for two in the powerplay, du Plessis anchoring, Klaasen taking 29 from 19 in the middle overs, and 55 from the last 23 balls: this is the innings the Dockers' team sheet has been threatening to produce since August. Faf du Plessis reached fifty from 42 balls and hit four sixes in his 60 — a captain's innings in the literal sense, in that he was there for seventeen of the twenty overs and left with the total set up.

Michael Bracewell was the reason it was 176 and not 210. He removed McDermott and Klaasen in his four overs, then had du Plessis caught by Curtis Campher in the eighteenth, and finished with 3 for 30 — the only Amsterdam bowler to take more than one. At the other extreme, Richard Gleeson's four overs cost 57, which on any other afternoon would have been the story of the match.

It was not, because of what David Wiese did to the last three overs. Sixteen balls, three fours, four sixes, 43 not out at a strike rate of 268.75. He came in with Rotterdam 121 for 5 and 23 balls left; he left them on 176. Twenty-four hours earlier he had made 10 from 12 and been caught and bowled. It is the most reliable thing about him — whatever the state of the innings, he still hits the ball as hard as anyone in this competition.

Amsterdam's start was chaotic in the way good chases sometimes are. Steven Smith hit two fours in four balls and was caught behind off Wiese in the second over. Yuvraaj Samra then hit two sixes in an 18-ball 25, the powerplay closed at 58 for 1, and Ben Manenti — bowling his only over of the match — had Samra lbw at 65 for 2.

That was the last thing that went right for the Dockers.

Bas de Leede reached his fifty from 33 balls. Tim David reached his from 32. Their stand went past fifty in 40 balls and past a hundred in 67, and it ended only because Amsterdam ran out of runs to score. De Leede finished 69 not out from 50 with seven fours; David 68 not out from 35 with five fours and four sixes. In a chase of 177, two batters made 137 of them without being separated.

Rotterdam's bowling had no plan that worked and, more damningly, no over that worked. Anrich Nortje was excellent — 4-0-23-0, the only spell on either side under six an over — and it made no difference at all, because Logan van Beek's 3.4 overs cost 52 and Roelof van der Merwe's four cost 39. Jai Moondra bowled two overs for 27 and was not seen again. Six bowlers, one of them good, and a chase completed with fourteen balls to spare.

The Hague on Sunday was a batting ground twice over. The earlier match between Glasgow and Edinburgh produced 322 for nine. This one produced 354 for eight in 37.4 overs — a combined run rate of 9.39. Both chasing sides won, both won with overs in hand, and neither new ball did anything meaningful after the first three overs.

That is worth holding against Saturday, when the same square produced twenty wickets for 241 in an evening game. The variable is not the pitch so much as the hour: Westvliet under Saturday's later start swung and seamed, and its two daytime fixtures on Sunday did neither. Both captains on Sunday chose to field. Both were rewarded. Anyone winning the toss here in the afternoon now has a very easy decision to make.

No preview for this fixture, so nothing to grade — but there is a running read of ours that this match directly contradicts, and it should be said plainly. After Rotterdam were bowled out for 93 on Saturday, we wrote that "the batting question is real and urgent: they have the names, they have not had to prove it, and on the one day someone asked them to, they made 93".

Twenty-four hours later they made 176 with contributions from du Plessis, Klaasen and Wiese, and lost by eight wickets. We were reading a two-day-old collapse as a structural flaw. The structural flaw is elsewhere. Rotterdam have won three matches this tournament and chased in all three; they have never successfully defended a total. On Sunday they posted their highest score of the season and their bowlers — the unit we described after the September 2 win over Dublin as the most reliable in the competition — went for 178 in 17.4 overs. That is the call we should have been revisiting, and we were looking the other way.

Amsterdam Flames are third on seven points from six, with three wins in a row and a net run rate of 0.441. Belfast Wolves, Edinburgh and Dublin remain. The encouraging thing is not de Leede's 69 or David's 68 in isolation — it is that Bracewell took 3 for 30 and then watched from the pavilion while the batters finished it in seventeen overs. This is a side whose best players are contributing in both innings.

Rotterdam Dockers are fourth, also on seven points from six, separated from Amsterdam only by a net run rate of -0.474 that these two defeats have hollowed out. Glasgow, Belfast and Edinburgh are to come, and the Belfast fixture still looks like a shootout for second — but at some point they will need to defend a total, and they have not done that once all season.

Tim David's 68 not out from 35 is the innings to carry forward. He faced 35 balls, hit four sixes, and was not required to take a single risk in the last four overs because de Leede had already made the chase safe. That is what a settled middle order looks like — and it is precisely the thing Rotterdam, with a far more famous batting card, has not been able to assemble.