Ireland v USA T20 Match Report

Ireland achieved their record high score in Twenty20 Cricket yesterday as they opened with a marvellous 202 (for 4) against the United States of America.

William Porterfield won the toss and chose to bat first. He formed an excellent opening partnership with Niall O'Brien, scoring 83 for first wicket in 8.3 overs, and setting the pace early on. His replacement, Alex Cusack was just as good. Porterfield scored 45 and Cusack 46, but the real star of the innings was O'Brien, who looked destined for his first century at this level. He ended on 84 from 66 balls.

Kevin O'Brien scored three from three, but was once again too aggressive. Trent Johnston and Gary Wilson closed out the innings, scoring 12 and 5 respectively. Ireland ended with 202, a score of 10.10 runs per over.

The United States were always on the back foot and Ireland started amazingly with the ball, with their opponents 11 for 5 after 3.2 overs. Paul Connell and Trent Johnson were amazing, especially Connell with a record score of 4-14. Johnston took the other two wickets, ending with 2-17. The bowling throughout the team was much better than in the opener against Afghanistan, and each of the five bowlers stayed the duration.

American prospect Aditya Thyagarajan was amazing on his debut, but it wasn't to be his day, as the match was totally sewn up by his arrival. He scored a fantastic 72 not out, and is surely one to watch for the future. The player of the game, however, was Niall O'Brien with his astounding 84, which included twelve boundaries, two of which were sixes.

Scorecard:
http://www.cricinfo.com/2010iccwt20/engine/current/match/439502.html

Canada T20 Match Report

Eighteen year-old Hiral Patel was the hero for Canada as they defeated Ireland by four runs in a tense Twenty20 Cricket match in Sri Lanka at the Associates T20 Series. It was Patel's debut, and his 88 not out set a massive target for Ireland to beat. Ireland won the toss and chose to field, but it could have been an error, as they posted a wonderful 176/3 - a whopping 8.80 runs per over.

Andre Botha was the only Irish players to take any wickets; bowling both Rizwan Cheema and Ashish Bagai, as well as bowling and catching Umar Bhatti with the second last ball. Patel's unbeaten 88, Cheema's 34 and Bagai's 42 set Ireland a large score to overcome. Six other Irish bowlers were used to try and defeat Patel, but his batting was far too strong, scoring eleven boundaries. The Irish bowling economy was disappointing, with Trent Johnston's 6.50 (25 runs from 24 balls) Ireland's best score.

Ireland needed 177 runs from 20 overs, and were constantly playing catch-up. The openers started well - Porterfield and Niall O'Brien had a partnership of 51 for first wicket, in less than five overs. The Irish batsmen had to be very aggressive, and thus mistakes were much more likely. Wicketkeeper Niall O'Brien was Ireland's highest scorer with 50, Gary Wilson made 26, and Paul Stirling 22. Opener Porterfield scored 19, Andre Botha posted 11 runs, and Andrew White was 18 not out. Due to the aggressive nature of the twenty overs, Ireland attempted to go for extra runs at every opportunity. Thus both Kevin O'Brien and John Mooney were run out for 5 and 9 runs respectively. Botha was also run out, trying to meet the required 8.80 runs per over required.

The match went down to the last ball, and if White could have hit a six, Ireland would have won. This morning, that was not to be, and Ireland lost by four runs, ending with an impressive 172/8. On another day, perhaps Ireland would have not had as many run outs and Kevin O'Brien could have stayed batting and significantly helped our cause.

Full Scorecard

Ireland play Sri Lanka A again tomorrow (08:30 GMT) and then take on Canada in a rematch on Sunday at 06:00 GMT.