Australia romped home to their third successive win in the 2023 World Cup with a record-breaking 309-run win over Netherlands in Delhi on Wednesday (October 25). It was the biggest margin of victory in World Cup history. Contrasting centuries from Glenn Maxwell and David Warner along with fifties from Steve Smith and Marnus Labuschagne meant that Netherlands were set a mammoth target of 400 and to state the obvious, the chase never took off for the Dutch as they crashed to 90 all-out and to defeat by 309 runs.
Much like it has been through the tournament so far, the new ball under lights was a tough task for the batters and Netherlands had no answers to Australia’s pace attack or the craft of Adam Zampa. There were a few boundaries in the first few overs with Vikramjit Singh living adventurously but once the opening stand was broken, the floodgates opened for the Aussies who were relentless thereafter. Mitchell Starc, Josh Hazlewood and Pat Cummins were all too hot to handle for the Dutch batters who struggled to put bat to ball. The pacy hard length worked a treat for Australia and once Zampa came on, the end was hastened.
It was a massive reality check for Netherlands who earlier had to experience a massive onslaught from Australia’s batters on another fine batting surface at the Arun Jaitley Stadium. A flamboyant century from Warner and his century stand with Smith had got Australia rolling after the early dismissal of Mitchell Marsh. The duo were proactive from the get-go with Smith being the initial aggressor. Netherlands’ ploy of starting with spin backfired as Warner took the attack to Aryan Dutt early on and that set the tone for Australia’s innings.
A soft dismissal ended Smith’s stay but Labuschagne and Warner motored along merrily as Australia eyed a massive score. Netherlands, though, fought back admirably for a while to trigger a mini-collapse and at 290/6, the Dutch would have had hopes of curbing the final assault. And then, Maxwell happened. Struggling for form in recent times, the explosive hitter found his timing from the start and then went bonkers at the death to register a 40-ball hundred – the fastest-ever World Cup ton – nine balls quicker than Aiden Markram’s effort at this very ground in the opening week of this tournament.
For the first time in the tournament, Netherlands bowlers were under immense pressure and they weren’t able to cope with it. Once Australia had gotten to 399, there was only probability that loomed large in the game. One would have hoped for the Netherlands to put up a fight but they were simply outclassed by an Australian team that’s starting to gather some momentum.
Brief Scores: Australia 399/8 (Maxwell 106, Warner 104; van Beek 4-74) beat Netherlands 90 in 21 overs (Adam Zampa 4-8, Mitchell Marsh 2-19) by 309 runs
