LOVING IT: Dutchman Tim Gruijters is relishing his time with Taradale CC but today beating NTOB is high on the agenda. PHOTO/Warren Buckland
LOVING IT: Dutchman Tim Gruijters is relishing his time with Taradale CC but today beating NTOB is high on the agenda. PHOTO/Warren Buckland
THEY were teammates in The Netherlands last winter but today Tim Gruijters and Stevie Smidt will be plotting the demise of each other's teams in the Hawke's Bay premier men's club cricket competition.
Gruijters is a United Travel Taradale CC allrounder while Smidt will turn out for the Complete Flooring Napier Technical Old Boys (NTOB) in the Property Breakers-sponsored 50-over match at Nelson Park, Napier, from 11am.
The 24-year-old Dutchman, who captained Smidt in his hometown team of Quick CC in The Hague, is mindful Taradale will be underdogs in today's encounter that doubles as the final for the New Zealand Club Championship qualifier in the Bay.
NOTB have qualified for the nationals five times but in the past three years the men in red have enigmatically stumbled despite stamping their authority in other formats of the competitions.
Taradale, it is believed, are the only team not to have made the cut from the Bay.
Smidt says NTOB last year had also dedicated their game to captain Liam Rukuwai's mother who died a few days before the final.
"It was a big focus on Liam's mum so we had to get the job done against Cornwall," says the 26-year-old who is returning from an elbow injury layoff through winter while playing in the Dutch competition.
He has been frequenting the gym to build his triceps to prevent hyper-extending his elbow joint when bowling.
"I have a muscle imbalance with my work," says the forestry worker forearms have become stronger through using chainsaws and machetes.
That aside, Smidt says cricket will slip to the backburner for him as he focuses on his employment and future.
"It's difficult to juggle cricket and another job, especially if you're a non-contracted player because you're never guaranteed an income," he says, mindful of the depth and strength in young fast bowlers in the CD catchment area.
But he's happy with his decision to carve a niche in paid employment after returning from The Hague with English girlfriend Polly Jones, who works for New Zealand Wine Centre in Napier and is seeking Kiwi residency.
"I'm not saying my future in cricket is over but it's the best thing for me and my girlfriend."
Smidt says he and Gruijters are familiar with each other's strengths after the rapport they built overseas playing against the likes of retired CD skipper Kruger van Wyk, ex-CD player BJ Barnett (Wellington), ex-South African international Roland van der Merwe and Aussie spinner Xavier Doherty.
ELBOW REHAB: Stevie Smidt.
He rates the Dutch competition a little higher than the one here because of the number of quality overseas players allowed to play for a team.
"The club culture there was very good and they have a big club and they run it well.
"The Dutch are very welcoming and pretty cool people, too."
His mother, Sheila Smidt, a teacher at Napier Girls' High School, is a "passionate Welshwoman" so he has a British passport that enables him to ply his cricketing trade there, too.
During his two seasons in England he met his girlfriend at Wokingham, southwest of London.
His father, Dale, is a Hawke's Bay Cricket Association administrator and also led NTOB to a national club champs title in the early 2000s.
"You hear stories about those days and so a few of the younger guys want to tick that off in their career," says Stevie Smidt who went to the 2010 champs in Auckland.
NTOB will be without Christian Leopard who is at the New Zealand Under-19 competition as well as Jayden Lennox who is in Auckland for personal reasons.
"It's a big occasion so we'll be playing to our potential."Gruijters echoes similar sentiments to Smidt in terms of his time with the Maroons here as an import player.
He arrived here after Smidt and former dale cricketer Luke Wright suggested it was a good club.
He would have joined NTOB but Indika Senarathne is the regular import player there.
For Gruijters the Quick, which also is a football club at home, is the playground since he was a child.
"I was in the nines when I was just 7," says the Dutchman who started off as a footballer but at 11 opted for hockey after encouragement from his father, Felix, a salesman.
Incidentally, he played hockey competitively until he was 17 and is still a coach at the HDM Hockey Club where he will resume his duties when he returns.
His mother, Rachel, is an Englishwoman "so she kind of said play cricket".
"You always listen to your parents when you're young," he says with a laugh.
On Smidt, he says: "He's brilliant. He's too quick for the batsmen there and a good lad to have in the changing room."
The plan to get him out is in place.
"Bowling to him can be difficult because he hits in strange areas at backward of point.
"We'll just attack his leg stumps," says Gruijters who only bowled two balls to him in a T20 match when Smidt didn't score any runs.
Taradale have lost all three encounters to NTOB, including two one-dayers.
"Sean is right. We haven't shown our ability against Tech," he says echoing sentiments of coach Sean Davies, who says Taradale aren't out to do anything brilliant but play solid cricket although it is hard not to have the club qualifier in the back of their minds today.
