The battle for an early advantage in this season’s competition resumes on Sunday with the second round of matches in the Hoofdklasse.

All matches will start an hour earlier, at 10 a.m., so that they can be completed before the annual commemoration of the victims of World War II and subsequent conflicts, which takes place at 8 p.m. and which literally brings the country to a standstill.

Two of Sunday’s games will pit winner’s from Thursday’s opening round against one another.

Sparta 1888, who received a happy lesson in the Duckworth/Lewis method when they beat HBS Den Haag, now get a reality check by taking on Quick Haag, whose nine-wicket victory over VOC Rotterdam emphasized what a strong outfit they are.

The match will be played on VRA’s main ground in Amstelveen, Quick’s Nieuw Hanenburg not yet being available.

Quick coach Wes Thomas had a dream start to his Hoofdklasse career against VOC, and the clash between him and Sparta’s former Pakistan Test batsman Mohammad Wasim should be worth watching.

For Sparta, two points against HBS was a valuable step in their battle to stay in the top flight, but it would be a huge upset were they to beat Quick whose strong batting line-up and fine seam attack should see them through.

HCC are at home to Hermes-DVS Schiedam, and again the winner of this clash will make it two out two and retain a share of the lead.

Hermes were much too strong for VVV Amsterdam on Thursday, but HCC will be a much tougher proposition, having beaten last season’s losing finalists Voorburg in their opening match.

HCC probably have the best-balanced squad in the competition, with the Myburgh brothers and skipper Feiko Kloppenburg leading the batting, a seam attack which includes the Jonkman twins, Bernard Loots and Andrew Murphy, and an experienced spinner in Jacob-Jan Esmeijer.

So this game at De Diepput will be an early test of whether Hermes are likely to strong enough away from home to mount a serious challenge for the play-offs. With both Ruud and Frank Nijman fit and available, they too have a well-balanced side, but it would not be surprising if HCC were to prevail in what seems certain to be a hard-fought match.

The other winners from Thursday are defending champions VRA Amsterdam, who travel to Rotterdam to take on a VOC side smarting from that nine-wicket defeat by Quick.

Bas Zuiderent’s men will need to bounce back quickly from that experience, and much may depend on how well the two seam attacks perform.

VRA’s bowlers did well to contain the Excelsior batting on Thursday, while VOC’s were hammered by a relentless batting display from the Quick top order.

With Peter Borren and Ryan Maron in great early form with the bat, the champions will be hoping that their leading batsmen are equally capable of imposing themselves, but VOC’s own top order is impressive, and the Rotterdam side’s batting probably has greater depth.

VRA have never lost at Hazelaarweg since VOC moved there in 2004, so history is on their side, but this is a difficult one to pick and it would not be surprising if the home side were to edge the game this time.

Voorburg will travel to Schiedam to play Excelsior ’20. These are two sides with play-off aspirations who came up against tough opposition in the opening round, and they will know that a second defeat in what is likely to be a very even competition will put them at a real disadvantage.

Both teams are dependent on a few key players: Mark Cleary, Daan van Bunge, Luuk van Troost in the case of Excelsior; Tim de Leede, Steve Nottle and Mohammed Rafi in the case of Voorburg.

But Excelsior’s Rifaiz Bakas and Voorburg’s acquisition Johan Claasens top-scored on Thursday, while Malik Hussain and Safaraz Gondel are useful contributors for their respective sides.

This, too, is an intriguing fixture, and the outcome will tell us a good deal about how competitive these teams are really likely to be.

In the remaining game, VVV Amsterdam will be at home to HBS Den Haag at Het Loopveld East.

Both these sides suffered embarrassing batting collapses on Thursday, although HBS may have had the excuse that conditions were against them.

Even so, to be all out chasing 90 off 21 overs raises some serious questions, and HBS will need coach Shane Deitz and Mudassar Bukhari – who gets an early chance to shine against his old club – to contribute with the bat if they are not to slip into a relegation battle.

VVV did slightly better against Hermes, but they, too, need their top order to come off if they are to have any chance, while their attack is probably more vulnerable to quality batting than that of HBS.

This week’s predictions: Quick Haag, HCC, HBS, Excelsior, VOC.