Canada registered their maiden T20 World Cup win after beating Ireland in a thriller at New York’s Nassau County International Stadium on Friday, June 7. Both teams produced an entertaining encounter with Canada defending a 137 total by 12 runs in the last-over thriller.
In-form Nicholas Kirton top-scored with 49 runs off 35 balls as the Irish bowlers displayed impressive spells to restrict Canada to a 137/7 total. Ireland witnessed an early collapse but George Dockrell and Mark Adair’s 62-run stand for the seventh wicket took the game to the wire.
However, the fast bowler Jeremy Gordon successfully defended 17 runs in the last over by dismissing settled Adair and restricted Ireland to a 125/7 total. Gordon and Dilon Heyliger took two wickets each and Kirton bagged the Player of the Match award for his brilliant innings with a bat.
Bowlers, especially pacers, continue to find good amount of help from New York’s drop-in pitches as batters struggled to score freely in the the third match of this edition at the new venue. Craig Young and Barry McCarthy took two wickets each for the Irish side shocking Canada’s top-order batters.
Kirton and Movva added 75 runs for the sixth wicket to drive Canada from 53/4 to a 137/7 total which proved enough to fight. Ireland, who suffered a heavy loss against India in their opening game, once again failed to score freely in the powerplay as star batters Paul Stirling and Harry Tector failed to impress.
Ireland found themselves at the bottom of the Group A points table with two defeats while Canada jumped to third place with two points in two matches. Canada will next face Pakistan in New York on June 11 and Ireland will seek their first win when they meet the in-form USA in Lauderhill on June 14.
Canada Playing XI: Aaron Johnson, Navneet Dhaliwal, Pargat Singh, Nicholas Kirton, Shreyas Movva (wk), Dilpreet Bajwa, Saad Bin Zafar (c), Dillon Heyliger, Kaleem Sana, Junaid Siddiqui, Jeremy Gordon.
Ireland Playing XI: Andrew Balbirnie, Paul Stirling (c), Lorcan Tucker (wk), Harry Tector, Curtis Campher, George Dockrell, Gareth Delany, Mark Adair, Barry McCarthy, Joshua Little, Craig Young.