Best Dutch innings to date as futile as protesters' banners

This match was saved from becoming another World Cup yawn by two men with something to say. "Zimbabwe needs justice," read the banner they paraded along the embankment that hugs the eastern boundary at Queen's Sports Club.

For long, free minutes they pranced and danced, and inspired the hundreds around them to do the same. Then came a second banner, "Mugabe = Hitler".

The police could stand it no longer and led them, along with some of their supporters, out of the ground.

There is no altering the fact that Zimbabwe is a country stifled of its voice, nor that Holland needed Robert Mugabe's election campaign managers to win yesterday's match.

The Dutchmen were game, but they needed to be more than that to get past Andy Flower's bustling intensity. Not to mention Andy Blignaut's booming confidence.

Flower fashioned a half-century with skill, diligence and not a little attention to the groin strain he dragged into the game. Blignaut also celebrated 50, but his was a gladiator's innings demanding applause at each wrenching turn.

Then, just when the men in day-glo orange thought they had plugged the holes in the dyke, Heath Streak plundered 44 runs from half as many balls.

Feiko Kloppenburg and Edgar Schiferli mounted a gauche but effective opening stand, and there were nuggets of plucky batting as Holland compiled their highest total in five World Cup matches. Daan van Bunge drove through the covers and their captain, Roland Lefebvre, went down swinging.

But all the Zimbabweans had to do was keep a tidy line and length and maintain their standards in the field.

This they did, leaving the Holland innings as futile as waving a banner for freedom in the face of oppression.

ZIMBABWE

C B Wishart c Smits b Lefebvre 21

M A Vermeulen b Kloppenburg 27

A Flower c Esmeijer b Schiferli 71

G J Whittall c Zuiderent b Kloppenburg 30

D D Ebrahim b de Leede 32

A M Blignaut c Kloppenburg b Schiferli 58

*H H Streak c Esmeijer b de Leede 44

D A Marillier lbw b Lefebvre 1

T Taibu not out 7

Extras (lb3, w7) 10

Total (for 8, 50 overs) 301

Fall: 24, 82, 135, 165, 245, 274, 281, 301.

Did not bat: B A Murphy, D T Hondo.

Bowling: Schiferli 10-2-43-2; Lefebvre 8-0-38-2; de Leede 7-0-69-2; Kloppenburg 10-0-40-2; Esmeijer 9-0-60-0; Van Bunge 3-0-22-0; Mol 3-0-26-0.

HOLLAND

J F Kloppenburg c Streak b Hondo 18

E Schiferli b Streak 22

B Zuiderent run out 15

D L S van Bunge lbw b Whittall 37

T B M de Leede lbw b Murphy 1

L P van Troost c Hondo b Murphy 26

R H Scholte c Blignaut b Murphy 7

H J C Mol c Sub b Marillier 23

*R P Lefebvre b Marillier 30

J Smits not out 8

J J Esmeijer not out 3

Extras (b1, lb7, w3, nb1) 12

Total (for 9, 50 overs) 202

Fall: 41, 49, 80, 85, 127, 128, 148, 190, 191.

Bowling: Blignaut 10-1-30-0; Streak 10-1-36-1; Hondo 6-1-16-1; Murphy 10-3-44-3; Marillier 9-0-49-2; Whittall 5-1-19-1.

Umpires: S A Bucknor and T H Wijewardena.
Zimbabwe won by 99 runs.