Anatomy of a World Record

England are better than the Dutch, but there was a lot more to it than that.

England made 498 against the Netherlands. That broke the World record, and they also lost 9 balls. This means the Dutch were embarrassed, and it cost them over 1000 bucks in replacements.

The easy thing is to say that the Netherlands are a poor team, and England are the World Cup winners. And at the moment, both of these things are true. But to break a world record, many things must go your way.

Netherland's A

The first is not only that they were playing the Netherlands, but not even the full Netherlands team.

And while a lot is made of this as a second-choice England side. But it's also not the full-strength Netherlands lineup. They are missing Colin Ackermann and Roelof van der Merwe. Ackermann is a top-quality pro, Roelof is a veteran of South Africa and the IPL. But you can add in there Paul van Meekeren, Brandon Glover and Fred Klaasen. Even though Ackermann and Roloef are batters, but they can both bowl. You can add Michael Rippon, the former Dutch (now Kiwi) left-arm wrist spinner. Klaasen was the only one there, but was not fit. And any combination of that bowling lineup is stronger than what they had for this match.

The reasons are that for injuries, and for Dutch player to pull out of county for their national team, not only is it a pay cut. But they put their future contracts in jeopardy. So you have a situation where you're playing the most important summer you've ever had, and your best players are bowling for Northants second XI.

Also, England may not have been full strength, but they had Buttler and Livingstone. You may remember them from the IPL.

Experience

The Netherlands didn't just have replacement players; they had young guys. Learning their game.

Their leg spinner Philippe Boissevain is 21, has been coached at the Darren Lehmann Academy in Australia and is clearly in development. When he started getting hit by the David Malan, he went around the wicket. But he was inexperienced at this, because he was spinning the ball in when wrong'uns made more sense. And he bowled a backfoot no ball. It just didn't look like he'd ever done this.

Later he came around the wicket to the right-handers, and he pitched the ball outside off stump. The idea of coming around the wicket is to put the ball outside their eyeline on the legs.

Aryan Dutt also did something weird then he came around the wicket when the right-handers started smashing him. He delivered the following balls outside off as well, right into the swing arc. Offies do come around to the right-handers. But usually they bowl a back heel line, trying to slam the ball into the pads with no room. Not float it up gently at off.

And finally it was Bas de Leede, perhaps the most exciting prospect we've seen from the Netherlands. When he started getting hit, he used his fast-medium by going cross seam. But instead of banging it in, to get some inconsistent bounce, he bowled full. Later on he bowled two consecutive slower ball bouncers that were too straight with fine leg up. The ball is to be outside off so the batter has to drag it with no pace on the ball.

It's not lack of talent, these are mistakes from just not knowing what to do under this pressure.

Drops

Part of the reason England could put that much pressure on is that the Netherlands kept dropping their stars. They managed to drop three out of the four top scorers along the journey.

And the two important ones, Salt and Buttler. Both easy enough outfield chances. The Buttler one probably hurt the most. He had decided Peter Seelaar had to go, and had smashed a bunch of sixes. But Seelar was trying to go under the bat, give him no length to work with, and finally got the mishit only for Musa Ahmed to drop a dolly at long-on.

England would have kept going regardless, but if Salt and Buttler had gone early, the record would have probably been safe.