Northern Diamonds played a rare 50-over friendly against the Netherlands.
The scores:
ND: 413-9 (Burns 113*, Marlow 97, Armitage 55)
NL: 224-9
Diamonds won by 189 runs (DLS at work)
This was a thoroughly enterprising arrangement, but goes to show the chasms set between the different strata of cricket.
The one centurion wasn’t even a home-grown player. The 36-year-old Erin Burns is guesting for the Leeds-based franchise. She scored her runs off a mere 73 deliveries, hit eighteen fours and one six. Back at home in Australia she has amassed a mere five T20s for her country and a single ODI. But she still outscored all her team-mates, and her opponents by an even larger margin.
For the Dutch, their captain Sterre Kalis, no doubt part-facilitator of the match, marshalled her troops as best she could.
Babette de Leede (36) and Phebe Molkenboer (31) started promisingly with a stand of 86; the experienced Iris Zwilling added 37 in the middle order. The final total of 224 would have been fine, had it not been for that daunting target they were facing.
As for the home team, Emma Marlow, nominated captain for the day, did herself a power of good in scoring 97 and partnering Lauren Winfield-Hill (42) in an opening stand of 98. It was comforting too to see LW-H taking part. This was a game she might well have stood down for, but the Dutch can be grateful for her presence, the one established England player they faced.
We can only hope that more games of this type can find a regular place in the calendar. It’s the quickest way to ensure progress for nations outside the tiny elite bracket.
The Dutch will have learned far more from this one day of play at Headingley than any number of contests against Associate Member countries like Thailand, UAE and Vanuatu.
