Max ODowd - Netherlands - Batsman

With his flowing locks and baseball-backlift, ebullient opener Maxwell O’Dowd is an instantly recognisable figure at the top of the Dutch batting order. Son of former Auckland bat Alex, O’Dowd split his childhood between New Zealand and his mother’s homeland of the Netherlands, where he lived until his early teens. In part a product of the youth system at Auckland, whom he represented at under 19s level, and in part of the venerable Royal Haagsche Cricket Club, where he played youth cricket while his father was player-coach for the club during a second stint in the Netherlands. Despite the family moving back to New Zealand O’Dowd continued to represent the Dutch at age-group level. He turned out for the Dutch under 15s and under 19s before making his debut for the senior side against Papua New Guinea in 2015, in the Netherlands’ opening match of the final Intercontinental Cup, going on to make his T20I debut in a bilateral series against Nepal two weeks later. Initially seen as a T20 prospect, O’Dowd would be picked for the Netherlands squad that won through the 2015 T20 Qualifier and for the disappointing ensuing 2016 World T20 campaign, that saw the Dutch exit in the preliminary round before O’Dowd got a game.

Despite his unconventional set-up at the crease, in practice O’Dowd reverts to a comparatively orthodox stance pre-delivery, notably circumspect early in the innings and at his strongest hitting down the ground. A First Class century against Ireland in the Netherlands’ penultimate Intercontinental Cup fixture in 2017 is testament to a sound technique, and he boasts an average over 40 in red-ball cricket, though his career in whites for the Dutch was cut short by the tournament’s abolition later that year.

By then O’Dowd was based back in the Netherlands opening for VOC Rotterdam during the northern summer, and a semi-regular for the national team, albeit usually batting down the order. With the Dutch having lost their status in 2014 however, he would have to wait until 2019 to make his official ODI debut, opening the batting against Zimbabwe. His 86* in that match and subsequent purple patch cemented his place as first-choice white-ball opener, and 16 months later it was from the top of the order that he became the first Dutchman to score a century in men’s T20Is, striking an unbeaten 133 off 73 against Malaysia at Kathmandu. His twin fifties against Ireland and Namibia were the sole highlight for the Netherlands at a calamitous 2021 T20 World Cup, but the Dutch had more success at the subsequent edition, and two more half-centuries against Sr Lanka and Zimbabwe at that tournament caught the eye the Chattogram Challengers, who would pick O’Dowd for the 2023 BPL.