It was a cloudy day in Rotterdam and the team where looking for another 2 points to take back to Voorburg. However, they had to find the venue first. Some found it within seconds and others where driving in circles around the magnificent De Kuip stadium but luckily, we all got there at the end. With some good warming up and stretches the teams where ready for the toss. When flipping a coin there is a 50% chance of winning the toss however when Floris de Lange is your captain it is more like a 10% chance and that is exactly what happened. Floris loosing another toss putting VCC 2 in for some fielding…
Sajjad and Stijn open the bowling for us but unfortunately couldn’t find a breakthrough. Our first bowling change came after 7 overs and I can tell you it was a good one as Steff took a wicket from his first ball, giving VCC a well needed boost. The score being 45/1 after 8 overs. Our second bowling change came in the 11th over with the skipper hoping for a wicket from Jakes. With Steff and Jakes bowling well, they couldn’t find that crucial wicket they where searching for and the Ghausia batsman where building a good partnership. Floris finally had enough of this partnership and took matters into his own hands and finally the wicket came trapping the batsman in front of the wickets and given out LBW. The score at this point was 96/2 after 20 overs. With the pressure being put on by Floris and Jakes, another wicket fell. It was the big wicket as well. Jakes bowling a half tracker to the batsman (which should have been hit for 4) and luckily the batsman missed timed it into Nehaan’s hands at midwicket. The next over Floris took another wicket bowling the batsman straight through the gate. The score at this stage was 106/4 after 24 overs. With two new batsman at the crease, both the spinners where looking for more wickets and more wickets is what they got. Floris getting another through the batsman edging one straight to Babette. Jakes then took 2 wickets in the same over. One through a beautiful diving catch from Stijn and the other by taking out the batters off stump. The score at this stage was 114/7 after 27 overs but t didn’t stop there for Floris and Jakes. Jakes going into his last over of his spell takes 2 wickets again and this brought up his first 5 wicket haul in for VCC 2. Floris then ended the Ghausia innings in the following over. Unfortunately falling 1 wicket short of a fiver as well. Ghausia ended on 120 all out with the Spin Twins taking 9 wickets.
After a good lunch, VCC 2 went in for a bat and things didn’t start of well as planned as both openers where dismissed for ducks in the first few overs putting a lot of pressure on the new batsman at the crease. Alyan and Nehaan where the new batsman at the crease and they made it look like they didn’t know what the word pressure meant. This shifted momentum back into VCC’s hands as they where building a good partnership of 80 runs before Nehaan got out caught and bowled. Nehaan ended up scoring 37 runs of 41 balls. The next batsman in was Nirav who only needed 1 run to achieve another Mars bar from Jakes. At this point Jakes might as well stop playing cricket as he is losing this, who can score the most runs wager against Nirav every week. With this in mind, Nirav played a solid small knock to stay with Alyan to the end. Alyan hit the finishing runs in the 24th over which also brought up a well-earned half-century. Alyan ended on 56 runs of 72 balls where he hit 8 fours and 2 sixes. Nirav ended on 12 runs of 21 balls which meant that Jakes had to owe Nirav his 18th Mars bar of the season. Things are not looking good for Jakes’s bank account, but it is looking good for VCC 2 as they bag another 2 points. Next week we face Qui Vive away in Amsterdam and the team is looking for revenge after a narrow loss last time.
