Pakistan Vs Netherlands World Cup Match Today: Can The Dutch Side Cause Upset?

Pakistan will take on the Netherlands in the second match of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2023 which will be played at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium in Hyderabad on Friday.

The Men in Green had lost both the warm-up matches and it will now be looking forward to start off the tournament on a positive note. The Babar Azam-led team will be taking on the Dutch side which is coming to the clash without practice matches which were hit by rains.

Head To Head

In the World Cup, both the teams have come face to face twice and the Men in Green had the last laugh on both occasions. Out of the six matches played, Pakistan emerged victorious in all six encounters.

In the last two clashes, Pakistan had defeated the Netherlands by 9 runs and 7 wickets, respectively. On the other side, the Netherlands is yet to secure a win against the Pakistani team.

The Pakistan squad is eager to kick off their World Cup campaign on a strong note. Particularly, in the warm-up matches, the bowlers faced a tough time dealing with the onslaught from the New Zealand and Australian teams.

Netherlands Wants To Enter Semis

Ahead of the encounter, star allrounder Bas de Leede said the squad members have only to gain from the World Cup experience. On asking whether it was better to play with a nothing-to-lose approach, he said, "I don't think any of the teams have got anything to lose. They've got something to gain, which is winning the World Cup. For us, obviously it's special being back for the first time since 2011, but we've set our goal high which is making the semifinal and I don't think if we don't make it, we're a failure or anything like that.

"If we don't make it, but we have played our best cricket, we can still be proud of ourselves. But by setting the goal to make the semi-final, we can probably do more than what people expect from us. So yeah, I think it's a mixture of having nothing to lose, but also trying to perform at our best again after 12 years," PTI quoted the 23-year-old as saying.

It has to be seen whether the Dutch side can cause an upset today and make the tournament more interesting.

Squads:

Pakistan

Babar Azam (c), Shadab Khan, Fakhar Zaman, Imam-ul-Haq, Abdullah Shafique, Mohammad Rizwan, Saud Shakeel, Iftikhar Ahmed, Salman Ali Agha, Mohammad Nawaz, Usama Mir, Haris Rauf, Hasan Ali, Shaheen Afridi, Mohammad Wasim.

Netherlands

Scott Edwards (c), Max O'Dowd, Bas de Leede, Vikram Singh, Teja Nidamanuru, Paul van Meekeren, Colin Ackermann, Roelof van der Merwe, Logan van Beek, Aryan Dutt, Ryan Klein, Wesley Barresi, Saqib Zulfiqar, Shariz Ahmad, Sybrand Engelbrecht.