Netherlands captain Scott Edwards plays a shot during the ICC Cricket World Cup 2023 match against South Africa at the HPCA Ground in Dharamshala on Tuesday October 17, 2023.
| Photo Credit: R.V. Moorthy

The historic upset win over South Africa is not a fluke as Netherlands have the potential to beat any side in the ongoing World Cup if they play their best brand of cricket, asserted captain Scott Edwards.

The Dutch stunned South Africa by 38 runs in their round-robin league clash here on Tuesday, their first win against a Test playing nation in World Cup history. The match was reduced to 43-over-a-side affair due to rain.

“We go into every game with our plans and our ways that we’re going to try and win the game. For us it’s just about playing our best brand of cricket and we feel like if we play well enough on the day, we can beat any side,” Edwards said at the post-match press conference.

It was also Netherlands’ third 50-over World Cup win and first in 16 years. They recorded their maiden victory against Namibia in the 2003 edition in South Africa. Their second win was against Scotland in the 2007 edition in the West Indies.

Netherlands made it to the main tournament in India through the qualifying round and Edwards said his side did not come here just to make up numbers.

“Yeah, absolutely. I think after qualifying we were pretty quick to set our minds to what we wanted to do at this tournament. We weren’t coming here just to have fun and enjoy it. We’re here to win games of cricket and give ourselves the best chance to make the next stage,” Edwards said.

“South Africa is obviously a very strong side and they’ll be close to that semi-final spot. So, if we want to be amongst them, we’ve got to beat sides like this,” said the 27-year-old wicketkeeper.

The Dutch were reeling at 140 for seven in the 34th over before Edwards himself engineered a remarkable recovery with an unbeaten 78 off 69 balls to take his side to a fighting 245 for eight. They then shot South Africa out for 207 in 42.5 overs.

Asked what transpired between him and other batters when they were looking down the barrel, Edwards said, “As a group we pride ourselves on playing total cricket which is guys that are coming in at number 8, 9, 10 have just as much of the ability to put on those partnerships.

“But out there batting with them, it was just about giving ourselves a chance to go harder later in the innings. And luckily enough, Roelof (van der Merwe) and Aryan (Dutt) in there played some unbelievable cameos to get us to what we thought was probably a par score.”

Netherlands team celebrates after winning the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023 match against South Africa, at HPCA Stadium, in Dharamshala on October 17, 2023.
| Photo Credit: PTI

For a set of activities that are governed by clear rules, unpredictability is what makes sport a compelling watch. The Netherlands’ defeat of South Africa just a few days after Afghanistan’s triumph over England in the ICC Cricket World Cup would not have been predicted by even the keenest observers of the game. Where do these upsets rank among other victories by underdogs over favourites in all World Cup games? 

To answer that question, we take recourse to the use of the Elo ratings method. Elo ratings, developed by professor Arpad Elo for games such as chess, can be replicated for other two-team sports as well. The Elo system assigns a rating to each team, using the results of previous international games. The ICC uses a similar system to rate and rank its teams but it only publishes the current rankings of each team.

 We relied upon the work of Gaurav Sood and Derek Willis (outside_edge at github) who constructed an algorithmic approach to calculate monthly Elo ratings for each ICC cricket playing nation/team, to identify the Elo ratings at the start of each World Cup. Sood and Willis had brought out ratings for each team till late 2021, but The Hindu used the same method of extracting match information from ESPNCricinfo for later ODIs and found the Elo ratings till October 2023. More involved Elo calculations that account for individual player ratings have been undertaken by others such as Kartikeya Date (@cricketingview in X) but only for Test playing nations. 

The Elo ratings of any two teams playing a game during any World Cup are an indication of their prior and recent performances and their respective strengths. The difference in their rating would indicate the gulf between the two sides. A team with a lower ELO rating, defeating one with a higher one could constitute an upset and if the Elo difference is quite high, it would qualify as a major upset. 

Table 1 | The table lists the major upsets in all games played in the World Cup till Tuesday.

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The Netherlands’ defeat of South Africa on Tuesday was despite a gulf of a whopping 457 points between the Elo ratings of the respective teams. This was the second biggest upset after Bangladesh’s defeat of Pakistan in the 1999 World Cup (Elo difference of 569 points). Afghanistan’s defeat of England on Sunday was only the 13th biggest upset, largely because the former had a better cricketing resume in the lead up to the World Cup, leading to a difference of 255 points in their Elo ratings. If not for technical reasons, this defeat would have rated 12th, as the 6th biggest upset – New Zealand losing to Kenya – was due to the former forfeiting the game after refusing to take the field in Nairobi citing security concerns. 

Table 2 | The table lists the favourite teams and the teams that won the various World Cups throughout the years.

Having the highest Elo ratings at the start of the World Cup is not always a guarantee of a team’s success as Table 2 shows. Only West Indies in 1979 and Australia in 2003 and 2015 managed to live up to their status as favourites by winning the trophy. And India in 1983 and Pakistan in 1992 were the most unfancied teams that went on to lift the World Cup. Not for nothing are Kapil’s Devils continued to be feted in India for heralding a cricketing revolution in the country. Former Prime Minister Imran Khan might be currently in the lowest ebb of his political career, but the sheer scale of his triumph as cricket captain in 1992 could explain how he managed to reach a peak in popularity in Pakistan. 

Table 3 | The table lists the Elo ratings of all the teams currently playing in the 2023 World Cup.

 (With technical inputs from Rishywanth Ambalam)

Source: ESPNCricinfo, outside_edge at github (Work of Gaurav Sood and Derek Willis)

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