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Tim Pringle and Logan van Beek’s three-wicket hauls backed up by Max O’Dowd’s patient half-century got Netherlands over the line in a nervy chase in their opening game of the T20 World Cup 2024, against a spirited Nepal in Dallas.It was a rude welcome for Nepal in their first T20 World Cup in a decade, with the Netherlands bowlers putting up a fine show and bowling them out for a mere 106 in 19.2 overs. But Nepal weren’t done yet. They squeezed the Netherlands batters in the middle overs and took the chase into the 19th over. O’Dowd, however, held his own with an unbeaten 54. He rode his luck and made sure to take his side over the line by six wickets and eight balls to spare.Early-morning rain and overcast conditions delayed the toss by 30 minutes and Netherlands captain Scott Edwards had no hesitations in bowling after winning the toss. The bowlers backed up their captain’s decision with Pringle, van Beek, Paul van Meekeren and Bas de Leede all getting among the wickets.In reply, Nepal put up a fight but dropped a couple of crucial chances at key intervals.

Dallas turns blue and red, but Orange holds sway

The Grand Prairie Stadium can seat 7000 but the vocal Nepal fans made it feel a lot bigger, flocking in nice and early getting behind their team. But the overcast conditions assisted the Netherlands seamers and they got their first wicket through left-arm spinner Pringle, whose decision to keep giving the ball flight paid off as Aasif Sheikh’s thick outside edge found short third in the second over. Pacer van Beek then struck with his first ball, angling a length ball sharply back into Kushal Bhurtel and catching him plumb in front.Nepal’s players appreciated the lively support they got in Dallas•ICC/Getty Images

Fast bowler Vivian Kingma also found big movement as the Nepal batters found putting bat to ball an arduous task. In the first six overs, Nepal played and missed 17 of the 36 balls (47.22%), which is the highest for any team in a men’s T20I (for which ESPNcricinfo has ball-by-ball data available). They hit five fours but could only manage three singles and a two in the first six overs, as Nepal managed only 29 runs in the powerplay for the loss of two wickets.

A stranglehold in the middle and at the death

Rohit Paudel, the youngest captain at a T20 World Cup at 21, kept his composure but lost partners at a steady rate. He pumped Kingma for a four over covers in the seventh over, but Pringle came back in his second over to remove Anil Sah, his attempted sweep only going as far as deep backward square leg. Kushal Malla hammered van Meekeren for a four over mid-off but fell three balls later trying a repeat of that shot, deceived by the slower offcutter and spooning the ball straight up.Bas de Leede then got rid of Dipendra Singh Airee caught at slip as Nepal slipped to 53 for 5 after 11 overs. Paudel was busy during his 35 off 37 but ultimately perished giving Pringle his third wicket. Karan KC and Gulsan Jha added 22 off 17 balls for the eighth wicket – the second-highest stand of the innings – to push the score past 100. Van Beek ended the innings with a two-in-two.Rohit Paudel was resilient but fell right before the death overs started•AFP/Getty Images

Nepal apply the choke

Early wickets was the need of the hour, and Nepal managed that with Sompal Kami getting rid of Michael Levitt with his second ball, caught by the cover fielder. Both Kami and Karan kept the bowling tight conceding only four runs in the first 15 balls. Vikramjit Singh broke the shackles with two back-to-back fours but run-scoring remained slow. Nepal bowled 19 dot balls in the powerplay as Netherlands reached 36 for 1 after the first six.It was going to get tougher for Netherlands in the middle overs, with the spinners coming into the equation. Airee conceded just a single in his first over after the powerplay, before taking out Vikramjit with a length ball that beat the batter’s attempted slog sweep and caught him in front. An over earlier Vikramjit was dropped at deep backward square leg by Kami, but he couldn’t cash in.O’Dowd and Sybrand Engelbrecht tried to steady to ship in a 28-run stand before a run out brought about the latter’s end. O’Dowd struck a straight drive back at Kami, who expertly deflected the ball back onto the non-striker’s stumps and caught Engelbrecht short. Nepal conceded just 48 runs in the middle overs (6 to 15) making Netherlands fight for every run.Max O’Dowd took Netherlands home with an unbeaten 54•AFP/Getty Images

Composed O’Dowd steers Netherlands home

When Edwards fell cheaply, it felt Netherlands’ chase could go astray, but O’Dowd brought all his experience into play. He curbed his natural aggressive instincts and made sure he kept his end secure even when Netherlands went 40 balls without a boundary between the 12th and 18th overs. O’Dowd had a huge slice of luck when Paudel spilled a straightforward chance in the 18th over at long-off. He was on 40 at the time and Netherlands still needed 18 off 17, but the dropped chance seemed to ease his nerves. In the penultimate over, with Netherlands requiring 13 off 12, he smashed Abinash Bohara for a four and six to reach his 13th T20I fifty. De Leede then finished the chase with a four through covers, triggering a sigh of relief in the Netherlands camp and securing two crucial points.

Ben Stokes has allayed concerns about the knee injury that hampered his bowling at Brisbane last week, after coming through an energetic nets session at Adelaide ahead of Thursday’s second Ashes Test.Stokes, 30, bowled just 12 overs in England’s nine-wicket defeat in the series opener, and was in obvious discomfort during his latter spells after appearing to jar his knee while chasing a ball to the boundary.However, he was back to full pace in the Adelaide nets on Tuesday, where he bowled for an hour under the supervision of head coach, Chris Silverwood, and also struck England’s captain Joe Root on the helmet and the arm in a lively display.”We will find out over the next couple of days,” Root had said before the net session. “He obviously had a bit of a jar in his knee in the last game. Hopefully it’s something he’s shaken off now, and he can get back to full intensity and all options are on the table. We will have to manage that and see where we are at.”Writing in his column for the Mirror, Stokes confirmed that his knee had affected him at Brisbane, but also that it was not a new issue that had arisen during the match.”People will have seen me rubbing my knee from time to time when I was in the field, but rest assured I’m fine,” he wrote. “It is an old injury that flares up every now and again, but I know how to manage it.”It just gets a little bit uncomfortable every now and again in and around my cartilage. But it just looks worse than it is by the way I try and get off it as soon as I can.”The contest was Stokes’ first Test appearance since the tour of India in February, and his first competitive fixture since taking a lengthy break during the English season to manage his mental health in the wake of a badly broken finger. He made scores of 5 and 14 in his two innings, and also reprieved David Warner with a no-ball, after over-stepping while bowling him in Australia’s first innings.”Having a long break is going to show itself I guess, but there are no excuses from me,” Stokes added. “I didn’t do anything whatsoever except take a catch and bowl a few no-balls, so the one positive is that I probably can’t get much worse than that.”Stokes’ ability to play as a frontline seamer is crucial to England’s hopes of balancing their attack, and may offer a reprieve to the spinner Jack Leach, whose 13 overs were hit for 102 runs in the first Test. His selection for that match was described by the former England left-armer Phil Tufnell as a “hospital pass”.Related

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England’s hopes of squaring the series at Adelaide may also be boosted by the impending recall of James Anderson, who claimed his first five-wicket haul in Australia in the corresponding day-night fixture four years ago, and who bowled for 40 minutes in the nets after sitting out the opening match.England have lost ten of their last 11 Tests in Australia, and have not won in the country since their victorious tour of 2010-11. No England team has bounced back from an opening Test defeat Down Under since Len Hutton’s men in 1954-55, but Stokes remains confident that they can buck the trend.”We have a good track record of bouncing back pretty well after a defeat early in a series,” Stokes added in his column. “We came back against South Africa to win, we came back against the West Indies last year to win, so we’ve done it before and we can do it again.”Now is not the time to panic. It is about keeping a clear head and staying calm and making sure that our cricket is at the level we want it to be.

Australia have slain some of their demons in the ongoing T20 World Cup, having produced four successful chases to reach the semi-finals, but coach Justin Langer believes it will take “nerves of steel” to chase in a knockout game.Australia qualified for Thursday’s semi-final in Dubai on the back of a successful chase against West Indies in Abu Dhabi on Saturday and are likely to face Pakistan in the knockouts for a place in the final.The tournament has been dominated by the chasing teams, particularly in Dubai where nine of the 10 matches have been won by the chasing teams, with New Zealand the only side to win batting first, in a day match against Scotland.Related

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Australia lost their only match of the tournament when they were sent in by England under lights in Dubai and slumped to 21 for 4. But as good as Australia have been chasing, and as dominant as the chasing teams have been overall, Langer was wary of the pressure that comes with runs on the board in a knockout final.”Most teams are winning chasing and you saw with a set-up of our side with the extra batter for most of the games in the lead up to this [semi-final] that we’ll back ourselves to chase anything,” Langer said. “That said, finals are a different proposition. So we’ll wait and see. There’s also been the dew factor that didn’t really come into it last night, we didn’t think [it did] in Sharjah.”But it takes nerves of steel to chase big scores in finals. It’s certainly worked out well so far.”Mitchell Marsh and David Warner put up a match-winning stand against West Indies on Saturday•ICC via Getty

Langer has been rewarded for a bold shift in strategy moving away from Australia’s long-time preference to play six batters and five bowlers, opting for seven batters and four bowlers with just one spinner for the majority of the tournament. The only exception in this trend was the heavy defeat at the hands of England.Mitchell Marsh and Glenn Maxwell bowled four overs between them against West Indies for just 22 runs while Australia’s three quicks took six wickets.Marsh also made a brilliant half-century in the chase batting at No. 3. But Langer was especially full of praise for David Warner who scored 89 not out, saying he never doubted his opener would come good after a lean run coming into the tournament.”I’ve never seen him as fit as he is at the moment,” Langer said. “He’s always fit. But this is at a different level at the moment. You’ve got to work very hard at his age. For him to do what he’s doing, you saw the way he played, ran between wickets yesterday, [in] hot conditions – it’s a great tribute to his professionalism and how hungry he is to keep playing great cricket. So, it’s nice to see him getting the results he’s had to play two amazing innings for us. And let’s hope he stands up again in the finals like the other boys have been doing so far.”Australia’s possible semi-final against Pakistan will also see Langer face his close mate and long-time Test opening partner, Matthew Hayden, who has been a batting consultant for Pakistan during the T20 World Cup.”The difference is we’ll be sitting on the sidelines watching,” Langer said. “But he’s enjoying it. We’ve been back and forth messaging throughout the tournament. No insights, though. We’re sort of keeping business to business.”It’s going to be good to see him. I haven’t seen him for a long time. But there’s lots of relationships in cricket and when it comes to Thursday night, we’ll put our friendship down for three hours and we’ll get to business and it should be good fun.”

Sydney Thunder have signed 19-year-old England quick Issy Wong while Melbourne Stars have recruited left-arm orthodox spinner Linsey Smith for the upcoming WBBL.Wong was an extremely late addition to the Thunder squad after Shabnim Ismail was ruled out of the tournament with a knee injury. The 19-year-old, who has been part of England’s training squad, was preparing to go on holiday to Italy when she got a call from Thunder coach Trevor Griffin.”It was a no-brainer,” Wong said. “When you get such an opportunity you can’t say ‘no’ to it.”This really is a great opportunity for me. I’m still very young, and to have this sort of exposure, and in such a respected league as the WBBL, is super-exciting.”I’m grateful to Sydney Thunder for putting their faith in me and giving me this opportunity.”Meanwhile, the Stars have added the experienced Smith to bolster their attack. Smith, 26, has played 9 T20Is for England and took 9 wickets in just 7 matches in the women’s Hundred for Northern Superchargers, at an excellent economy rate of 5.54.Stars coach Jarrad Loughman was pleased to add a senior bowler to his young side.”Linsey will add another level of versatility to our squad this season with her left-arm spin and batting in the middle order. Her experiences on the international stage will be beneficial to our squad, that is diverse in age and experience,” Loughman said.”She had a terrific English summer, highlighted by a strong tournament at The Hundred.”The Stars have also signed 20-year-old wicketkeeper Maddy Darke. She has previously played for Sydney Sixers in the WBBL but was starved of opportunity behind Alyssa Healy. Darke toured England with Australia A in 2019 and is currently part of Western Australia’s WNCL squad having moved from New South Wales in 2021.

Less than half an hour after Afghanistan announced their squad for the upcoming T20 World Cup, Rashid Khan stepped down as captain, saying “the selection committee and ACB has not obtained my consent for the team which has been announced by ACB media”. It is understood that the team will now be led by allrounder Mohammad Nabi.Rashid had been named captain in the squad put out by the ACB’s official Twitter handle, but said he was stepping down, effective immediately through his own tweet, posted 22 minutes after the ACB’s.