South Africa chose to bowl vs Netherlands
Under cloudy skies and in cool conditions at Willowmoore Park, Temba Bavuma chose to chase, with the possibility of an interrupted game top of mind. With World Cup Super League points on the line, South Africa want to make sure they know exactly what they need to do to secure points.
South Africa are in 10th spot, currently out of the automatic qualification zone for the 2023 World Cup and must win both these matches (the first one took place in November 2021 and the rest of the series was then postponed as a new variant of Covid-19 was discovered), and hope Ireland lose at least once to Bangladesh in May. Earlier today, Sri Lanka were confirmed as out of the running for the main draw immediately and will play in the qualifiers in Zimbabwe in June and July.
Quinton de Kock confirmed that South Africa want to avoid that as far as possible. As such, they held back their first-choice players from going to the IPL, which starts today, on time and will field a full strength XI. Bavuma passed a fitness test after tweaking his hamstring against West Indies and will open the batting alongside de Kock. Aiden Markram, Heinrich Klaasen and David Miller make up the middle-order while South Africa have four seam options and one specialist spinner in Tabraiz Shamsi.
Netherlands are at the bottom of the World Cup Super League table and are using these matches as preparation for the qualifying event. They are without Roelof van der Merwe, who left the tour for personal reasons, Colin Ackermann, Bas de Leede and Brandon Glover have been released for the start of the county season.
The last time these two teams met, Netherlands beat South Africa in a group stage match at the T20 World Cup, which sent South Africa out of the tournament.
South Africa: 1 Quinton de Kock (wk), 2 Temba Bavuma (capt), 3 Rassie van der Dussen, 4 Aiden Markram, 5 Heinrich Klaasen, 6 David Miller, 7 Marco Jansen, 8 Sisanda Magala, 9 Kagiso Rabada, 10 Anrich Nortje, 11 Tabraiz Shamsi.
Netherlands: 1 Vikram Singh, 2 Max O’Dowd, 3 Musa Ahmed,4 Wesley Barresi, 5 Scott Edwards (wk, capt), 6 Teja Nidamanuru, 7 Shariz Ahmad, 8 Aryan Dutt, 9, Ryan Klein, 10 Paul van Meekeren, 11 Fred Klaasen.