Captains back experience and preparation in Ireland-Netherlands opener

Overview Ireland v Netherlands
Old Hararians Sports Club, Harare
CWCQ, Match 3
Sunday 4 March; 09:30 local time, 07:30 GMT

Two highly experienced outfits battle it out in Group A though it’s the Irish side who go into the match as favourites.

They certainly have history on their side. In 10 ODIs between 2006 and 2013 while the Netherlands were a full ODI team, it was seven wins to Ireland and one win to the Netherlands, with one no-result and a tie.

The two sides also met in the ICC Cricket World Cup Qualifier 2009 match in Pretoria on 15 April 2009, in which Ireland comfortably defeated the Netherlands by six wickets.

The Netherlands arrive in Zimbabwe looking to book their place at the Cricket World Cup for a fifth time in their history. They qualified for this event by winning the World Cricket League Championship and reclaiming ODI status as a result.

They lost just two matches throughout their World Cricket League Championship campaign, with defeats to Nepal and Kenya. Their only other setbacks were two no-results against Scotland at the very start of the tournament due to inclement weather in Amstelveen.

Netherlands captain Peter Borren says his team have an advantage over Ireland having played both their warm-up matches at the venue of their tournament opener.

“Our preparations have probably been better than some of the other teams which have been affected quite nicely by the weather," said Borren. "But we have been pretty lucky apart from Thursday against Afghanistan.

“We play our first game against Ireland at the same venue where we played our two warm-up matches, so it’s an advantage we have over them. In saying that, Ireland are very a good side and we will have to be at our very best to win that game.”

Ireland have the upper hand on the Netherlands having beaten them by five wickets in a warm-up on 18 January with Boyd Rankin taking 4/38 and Andrew Balbirnie scoring 97.

Long-serving skipper William Porterfield says Ireland, who are coached by former Sri Lanka coach Graham Ford, are a side in form.

“We are very confident," said Porterfield. "We have played some very good cricket over the last few months. We won a couple of important series and played some good cricket along the way.

“The confidence was shown in the warm-up match against Scotland when we got into a tricky situation, we had the confidence that took us over the line and that will boost our confidence even more.

“Every game is going to be a tough game, no matter which group you are in. I have seen a few interesting scores in the warm-up games, so we don’t know how the pitch is going to play in Harare.

“When you look at the scores and judge from the scores, it can be a pretty level playing field just with the surfaces. It is going to be interesting to see what a good score is, what is going to be a defendable score and things like that."

Porterfield is joined by consistent run-getters and English county cricket stalwarts Paul Stirling, Ed Joyce, Gary Wilson and the O'Brien brothers in the batting department. Stirling smashed 156 from 128 balls in a warm-up fixture against Hong Kong.

But it's arguably the bowling attack which excites the most. The towering paceman Boyd Rankin will spearhead their bowling unit, while in Barry McCarthy they have a seamer who is in form and very much on the rise. Meanwhile, Tim Murtagh's mastery of swing, George Dockrell's canny left-arm spin and Stirling's useful part-time off-spin give Porterfield plenty of options.

**Key players Timm van der Gugten (Netherlands):**A fast bowler on each side spearheads their team’s attack. Offering slippery pace and plenty of experience in county and state cricket with Glamorgan and New South Wales, the Sydney-born 27-year-old is crucial in the attempts of Peter Borren’s side to take early wickets.

**Boyd Rankin (Ireland):**The strapping Warwickshire quick provides pace, bounce and bundles of experience. He’s taken 67 wickets in 51 ODIs and is Porterfield’s main weapon in setting the game up for the spinners later in the innings.

Squads **Ireland:**William Porterfield (c), Andrew Balbirnie, Peter Chase, George Dockrel, Ed Joyce, Andy McBrine, Barry McCarthy, Tim Murtagh, Kevin O'Brien, Niall O'Brien (wk), Boyd Rankin, James Shannon, Simi Singh, Paul Stirling, Gary Wilson
**Netherlands:**Peter Borren (c), Wesley Barresi (wk), Ben Cooper, Bas de Leede, Scott Edwards, Vivian Kingma, Fred Klaassen, Max O'Dowd, Pieter Seelaar, Shane Snater, Ryan ten Doeschate, Timm van der Gugten, Roelof van der Merwe, Paul van Meekeren, Sikander Zulfiqar