Duckworth Lewis win for Ireland over UAE

WHAT could have been a potential banana skin turned out to be a stroll under the floodlights in Bangladesh as Ireland placed one foot in the super ten stage of the ICC World T20 at the expense of the United Arab Emirates.

Despite the early retirement of Paul Sterling after he was struck on the elbow in the opening over of their innings, Ireland were galloping home to the 124 run target that they restricted their opponents to after William Porterfield once again made the call to put the opposition in to bat. But a mixture of rain and floodlight failure meant the game didn’t finish, but such was Ireland’s dominance, they were ahead of the target set by the Duckworth Lewis method when the heavens opened.

Despite the powerplay during the UAE innings yielding 46 runs against and just one wicket in Ireland’s favour, it seemed as though their opponents may just break old habits and find a way to score well against the Irish attack.

But it proved to be a false dawn. After the 6^th over when the powerplay ended, a boundary wasn’t scored again until the 16^th over and on a ground where the boundaries are relatively small, it is criminal for that to be the case.

Two wickets in the 7^th over from Paul Sterling certainly helped stem the flow of boundaries. The UAE had just managed 30 runs from 3 overs, but Sterling who took the new ball managed to tempt Amjad Ali into cutting but he edged it behind square where George Dockrell was waiting to take the catch.

The paltry total scored is also in no small part to the magnificent fielding from those in green shirts.  Bar a dropped catch from Stuart Thompson in the final over, there was very rarely a blemish in the field as it really frustrated and forced their opponents into chasing the game which proved to be fateful more often than not.

The 58 dot balls bowled by Ireland was nothing short of magnificent. That is just 2 balls short of 10 maiden overs (Or half of the innings). It was very impressive and it proved to be the basis for another victory at a major tournament.

Despite being hit on the elbow first ball, Stirling continued to play on for the rest of the first over and hit two delicious boundaries over the covers but then decided that it was two uncomfortable to carry on and will have an x-ray to determine the full damage of the injury which is hoped wont be too serious.

Ed Joyce then came to the crease and he and William Porterfield put on an excellent 75 partnership. Both players excelled during this passage of play, especially Joyce who used his feet well against the spin and dispatched the ball for his 5 boundaries in score of 43 of just 38 deliveries which earned him the Man of the match award.

Once Joyce went, it sparked a flurry of wickets where Kevin O’Brien and Andrew Poynter both went for low scores which gave a bit of respectability at 103-3.

The game looked to heading for a quick finish but not the one everybody was expecting. As Poynter was heading back to the pavilion there was a power outage at the stadium.  The players returned briefly for 5 minutes before the lights went again.

But then it started raining and the covers came on which forced the game to be abandoned to give Ireland a victory by 21 runs.

Ireland now meet the Netherlands on Friday knowing a victory will secure their path to next round of the tournament.