Resilience, relevance and the Dutch road ahead

As the tournament opener against Pakistan reached its climax, Logan van Beek could almost feel it – the payoff for preparation, the reward for belief, the validation of a plan unfolding exactly as intended. And then, as T20 cricket so often does, it flipped in a matter of five minutes.

"It was exciting because you're on the cusp of achieving what you wanted to achieve," van Beek reflected ahead of the USA fixture. "We were in control of that game. And for five minutes of that game, for it to completely flip…it was a very tough pill to swallow."

Van Beek had arrived at the tournament ready. He felt prepared for the situation as it developed – closing overs, pressure mounting, opportunity knocking. But sport does not always reward readiness. "I'm in this team to finish games with bat and ball," he said. "To not be able to do that in that situation was brutal."

He framed the defeat as part of a larger education and chose to focus on retribution in the very next game. "The beauty about sport is that it always gives you another chance," he said. That opportunity came quickly, in the form of a win over Namibia. The 35-year-old registered figures of 2 for 13 in 3 overs to set up a Dutch win. "It was some good healing in terms of reminding yourself that you still are a good cricketer. It's just T20 cricket. It happens a lot."

Now, with the USA next up and India looming thereafter, the Dutch stand at another set of crossroads. "What we have to do tomorrow night is put in a good performance against USA and then move into that India match with the spirit of we're going to do something special."

It is a mindset forged over 15 years. "It's not only the experiences that you have on the field," he said. "It's a great life teacher… I really treasure that resilience piece that cricket provides." Resilience is a recurring theme. As recently as in 2023, they qualified against all odds for a 10-team ODI World Cup ahead of full member nations.

Van Beek sees potential everywhere in the Netherlands. "Dutch people are traditionally quite tall," he noted. "There's a lot of hockey played. Physically, we could make some brilliant fast bowlers. When it comes to batting, they could have these amazing sweep shots, reverse sweeps. The tough thing is that the mentality in Holland is football and hockey is king. It's really hard to draw people away."

Still, he remains convinced that the Netherlands are on the right path – a belief reinforced by the women's team qualifying for the 2026 Women's T20 World Cup. "That's a huge achievement," he said. "For them to experience a T20 World Cup is massive for Dutch cricket as a whole."

Progress for now is measured within white-ball boundaries. Despite being part of global tournaments regularly since 1996, the Netherlands are yet to gain ICC Full-Member status. Test cricket, van Beek insists, is not an immediate ambition.

"There's no first-class cricket in the Netherlands," he pointed out. "No one plays red-ball cricket at all. There's only a couple of us that play first-class cricket in the squad. So I think right now, our focus is on T20 and 50 overs and making the final stages of these tournaments. And if we can make the final stages, then our push is that sponsors, funding, our ranking goes up. I think Test Cricket at this stage is not a focus."

In the shorter formats, growth has been tangible – particularly in squad depth. When Ryan Cook took charge in 2022, van Beek recalls the player pool was limited. "It was like, these are the 15 guys, regardless of what happens." Four years on, that landscape has shifted. Performances on the global stage have drawn attention from players with Dutch passports around the world.

"Now that pool of players has got bigger," van Beek noted. "There have been guys who have just missed out on selection because of that competition. And we need that as a nation."

As the Netherlands prepare to face the USA – another team charting its own growth curve – van Beek's words echo beyond a single fixture. They speak of a cricketing nation striving for relevance. In a format that can turn in five minutes, resilience may yet prove to be the Dutch's most enduring asset.