2009 national champions Excelsior ’20 may have arrived in the top flight a little later than many other leading Dutch clubs – it was only after World War II that they established themselves there, and they did not win the title until 1991 – but they have certainly made up for it since. They were the dominant side of the 1990s, and last season’s title was their eighth in twenty years.

The club fielded four senior sides last year – interestingly they took part in neither the Saturday nor Sunday recreational leagues – and a total of five youth teams from Under-10 to Under-18.

In the clannish world of Dutch cricket Excelsior’s stalwart families have included the Goukas, Schewes and Van Troosts, and it is Koos Gouka who is the new chairman of the club’s cricket section. He will be responsible for managing a crucial new phase in the Excelsior story, with the new turf square at Thurlede coming into use for the first time this year.

His greatest immediately priorities, naturally, are to maintain Excelsior’s high level of performance on the field, and to bring Thurlede up to ODI standard as quickly as possible. The ground is scheduled to host two Clydesdale Bank 40 matches in the course of this summer.

‘The biggest task facing us right now is putting in the dressing rooms which are an ICC requirement for ODI status,’ Gouka says. (The new ground came into use two years ago, and until now players and umpires have had to change in the old dressing rooms adjacent to the football pitches and at some distance from the main cricket ground.)

‘But in the longer term, we are determined to build up our youth section to the highest possible level,’ he adds. ‘Our youth committee, under the chairmanship of Bart Kroesen, is working hard to achieve this, and in addition to Daan van Bunge we will this year have the services of a specialised youth coach from South Africa.

‘David Sandman runs his own cricket school in Cape Town, and he will be available every day to work with the juniors. With Daan also involved and, we hope, our new player-coach concentrating on developing their batting skills, our young players will get plenty of opportunity to improve.’

Kroesen and Gouka hope that one or two of their more talented younger players will graduate to the first team over the next couple of seasons, but they also emphasise the broader appeal of the game.

‘The youth committee tries to emphasize that cricket is about having fun and building friendships,’ Kroesen says. ‘With events like “boys day” and festive opening and closing days of the season we are trying to attract more young players, but like other clubs we find that the increasing demands of football are making it more and more difficult.’

For a club of its size and ambition, it is perhaps a little surprising that Excelsior has until now had no women’s team. But that’s something Gouka hopes to rectify before long.

‘We have set up a committee to take on this task,’ he says, ‘and we aim to have a women’s team playing in the coming season.’

On the national level, the Excelsior chairman adds his voice to those who argue that the KNCB’s current approach is too ‘top-down’.

‘The Bond has to secure the base of Dutch cricket,’ he argues. ‘At the moment the KNCB – which means the ICC – gives all its attention to the Dutch team, and they also get the lion’s share of the money.

‘We are concerned that the domestic competition is in danger of becoming a sort of Cinderella.’

Together with local rivals Hermes-DVS, Excelsior ’20 has the great advantage of being located in Schiedam, which enjoys a special place in the Dutch cricket scene.

‘Our derbies are unique,’ Gouka says proudly, ‘and they always attract a large crowd of a thousand or so – which you can’t say of any other matches in the country. And we are very fortunate in having the support of the local authority.

‘But if we look at the wider region, things are unfortunately not as healthy. More needs to be done to promote the game to a larger Dutch public.’

As the voice of one of the most successful clubs in the country, and hopefully one of its newest ODI venues, Gouka speaks with undoubted authority. His anxieties will need to be taken on board as the KNCB works to create a platform for further development.