Quick Haag cricket chairman Robert Burger said on Friday that his club was ‘astonished’ by the decision of the KNCB Discipline Committee to dismiss the case against Dosti Amsterdam on procedural grounds.

‘We presented our evidence to the Board,’ he said, ‘and the Board chose to refer the matter to the Discipline Committee.

‘We have until now received no answer to our letter, and we await the Board’s response with interest. We believe we have a very strong case, and if the Board believes that the matter will now just go away, it is seriously mistaken.

‘This issue is too important to be left unresolved, and the ball is firmly in the Board’s court.’

The substantive allegation that Dosti fielded two ineligible players in eleven round-robin matches and two play-off games was not considered by the Discipline Committee, which ruled that the Board should have brought its case within thirty days of the matches in which the suspected players appeared.

But it was Quick who brought the matter to the Board’s attention, and only after a thorough investigation of the facts. Although Quick’s dossier has not been published, it is believed to argue that the two players concerned, Hamid Rana and Afzal Ahmed, live and work in England, play club cricket there, and travel to the Netherlands for Dosti’s more important matches. In such circumstances, neither player would be entitled to receive a dispensation to play in the Hoofdklasse.

According to the Discipline Committee’s judgement, however, Dosti stated that they had been granted a dispensation for Rana, and that they had believed they did not require one for Ahmed.